ROTTERDAM, Netherlands, Feb. 10 (UPI) -- Robin Soderling survived a third-set tiebreaker Thursday in advancing to the quarterfinals of the ABN AMRO World Tennis Tournament in the Netherlands.
Soderling, the tournament's No. 1 seed, capped second-round play with a 6-3, 5-7, 7-6 (9-7) victory over Philipp Kohlschreiber. It was the first time in four career meetings Soderling -- ranked fourth in the world -- beat the No. 36-ranked Kohlschreiber, and it didn't come easy.
Soderling won the first set after an early trade of breaks, but Kohlschreiber evened the match with a 12th-game break in the second set. They again traded breaks early in the third set and went to the tiebreaker to decide the match.
Soderling won the first point off Kohlschreiber's serve and each held serve until Soderling had his first match point. Kohlschreiber won that point and two more for a 7-6 lead before Soderling won three straight points and the match.
He'll meet No. 6-seeded Mikhail Youzhny in Friday's quarterfinals. Youzhny was a 6-4, 6-4 winner over Thiemo de Bakker Thursday.
Also Thursday, fourth-seeded Tomas Berdych defeated Dmitry Tursunov 6-4, 4-6, 7-5, No. 7-seeded Ivan Ljubicic ousted Benoit Paire 6-0, 6-4 and Marcos Baghdatis topped Feliciano Lopez 7-6 (7-3), 6-3.
In addition to the Soderling-Youzhny match Friday, the quarterfinal draw has Viktor Troicki playing Marin Cilic, eighth-seeded Jo-Wilfried Tsonga going against Berdych and Ljubicic facing Baghdatis.
