Montanes heads to Morocco quarterfinals

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CASABLANCA, Morocco, April 7 (UPI) -- No. 1-seed Albert Montanes piled up six service breaks Thursday in a second-round win at the Grand Prix Hassan II tennis tournament in Morocco.

Unlike Wednesday's second-round matches in which three of four seeded players were ousted, Thursday's schedule went to form with four seeded players moving into the quarterfinals.

Montanes had eight aces and won 56 percent of the points when receiving serve in a 6-1, 6-4 win over Filippo Volandri. Montanes dropped serve three times but had breaks in six of the eight games in which Volandri served.

Third-seeded Gilles Simon didn't lose his serve in a 6-3, 6-4 win over Frederico Gil. Simon faced only one break point and won 69 percent of the points on serve.

Potito Starace, seeded fifth, lost just 13 points in nine service games of a 6-4, 6-3 victory over Ruben Ramirez Hidalgo and No. 7-seeded Fabio Fognini rallied for a 1-6, 7-5, 7-5 win over Blaz Kavcic despite losing his serve eight times.

Friday's quarterfinal schedule has Montanes playing Fognini and Pere Riba meeting Pablo Andujar in the top half of the bracket while the lower draw sees Simon going against Starace and eighth-seeded Victor Hanescu facing Andrey Kuznetsov.