Murray beat Paul-Henri Mathieu in round one

Andy Murray defeated Spaniard Albert Montanes 7-5 6-3 to reach the quarter-finals of the China Open in Beijing.

Murray has now played Montanes four times and is yet to concede a set against the world number 24.

The British number one, seeded second, will play Ivan Ljubicic next after he beat Alexandr Dolgopolov 6-3 7-6 (7-2).

Third seed Robin Soderling beat Nicolas Almagro 7-5 4-6 6-3 to set up a clash with eighth seed David Ferrer, who beat Lu Yen-hsun 6-3 3-6 6-1.

Murray said: "I was leaving the ball pretty short, so he was able to dictate a lot of the points. So that's why I struggled a bit early on, but I played a little bit better towards the end.

606: DEBATE Will Murray win the China Open?

"I was a little bit more solid than he was, especially in the second set, and that was probably the main difference, but there wasn't too much in it."

The first four games went with serve - Murray winning both of his to love - but the Scot was stunned in game five when Montanes capitalised on his fourth break point with a stunning cross-court backhand winner.

Murray, 23, squandered a gilt-edged break-back opportunity at 3-4 and found himself serving to stay in the set in the following game, but held to force his 29-year-old opponent to serve it out.

However, the errors crept in for Montanes and a forehand winner from Murray at break point proved decisive and got the match back on serve.

Murray breezed through his next service game and then broke his rival for a second time to secure the set 7-5.

Montanes won the first two games of the second set before Murray reeled off five straight games to put himself firmly in control.

E-mail this to a friend

Printable version