Federer was a comfortable winner on Wednesday

World number two Roger Federer sealed his place in the quarter-finals of the Swiss Indoors in Basle.

Home favourite Federer beat Serbia's Janko Tipsarevic 6-3 6-4 to safely progress through to the last eight.

Andy Roddick continued his push for a place in the ATP World Tour Finals by beating Sam Querrey in the first round.

Returning after a fortnight on the sidelines with a knee injury, Roddick beat fellow United States player Sam Querrey 7-5 7-6 (8-6).

Both players fired in 16 aces in a hard-fought encounter.

World number one Rafael Nadal, Novak Djokovic, Andy Murray and Robin Soderling and Federer have already booked their places at the ATP World Tour Finals, when the world's top eight players will lock horns at London's 02 Arena from 21-28 November - leaving three slots yet to be filled.

Roddick is currently ranked third among the players yet to qualify, behind Tomas Berdych and David Ferrer.

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Federer needed just an hour to defeat his Serbian opponent and was delighted with his performance.

"That's two perfect matches in a row," said Federer. "How much better can it get?

"I played well, served well and had hardly any errors. This is about as good as it gets. If I can keep it like this for the whole event, that would be amazing."

But at the same time the 29-year-old does not want to risk over-confidence either.

"I don't want to get used to this, that could be a danger," he stated. "Beating Janko [who took him to five sets in their last match at the 2008 Australian Open] is a good win. He's on a Davis Cup finals team after all.

"I'm happy to get this win, but nothing is guaranteed."

In the earlier first-round games, Czech Radek Stepanek beat the Netherlands' Thiemo de Bakker 6-3 7-6 (7-5), while Jarkko Nieminen of Finland, a losing finalist in 2007, beat Germany's Daniel Brands 6-3 6-2 and set up a second-round meeting with Djokovic.

Meanwhile, Paul-Henri Mathieu - bidding for a place in the French Davis Cup team after Jo-Wilfried Tsonga pulled out with injury - beat Germany's Florian Mayer 6-3 6-3.

And Robin Haase defeated John Isner 6-2 6-7 (5-7) 7-5 to join Federer in the last eight.

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