MONTPELLIER, France (AP)—Defending champion Ivan Ljubicic of Croatia, third-seeded Gael Monfils of France and No. 6 Albert Montanes of Spain all reached the quarterfinals of the Open Sud de France in straight sets on Thursday.
Unseeded Gilles Simon of France and Jarkko Nieminen of Finland also progressed to the last eight with comeback wins.
Ljubicic overcame a slow start to beat Taylor Dent of the United States 7-5, 6-4, and Monfils had little trouble getting past Steve Darcis of Belgium 6-4, 6-4.
The fourth-seeded Ljubicic, who dropped his serve once in the opening set, hit five aces and broke Dent’s serve three times.
Ljubicic won the title when the tournament was played in Lyon last year and in 2001. He next plays Nieminen, who beat No. 7 Richard Gasquet 4-6, 7-6 (6), 6-2 as the Frenchman squandered match points and then crumbled.
Monfils had five aces in a win that took little more than an hour, and he next plays No. 5 John Isner of the United States.
The huge-serving Isner needs only one more ace Friday to reach 1,000 for the season. The 25-year-old American has already served 346 aces more than his previous best last season when he reached 653.
Montanes earlier beat Frenchman Michael Llodra 6-4, 7-6 (5), and Simon rallied to beat No. 8 David Nalbandian of Argentina 3-6, 7-6 (5), 7-5.
Although Montanes won in straight sets, the match was closely contested with Llodra hitting 10 aces and forcing Montanes to save four break points in the opener.
Nalbandian served twice for the match at 5-4 and 6-5 in the second set. Simon broke him to love on the second occasion to force a tiebreak and then leveled the match. He broke Nalbandian twice more in the deciding set.
Against Nieminen, Gasquet lost serve straight away and trailed 2-0 but then broke the Finn twice to take the first set.
Gasquet seemed in control when he led 6-4 in the second set tiebreak but Nieminen saved two match points in winning the next four points to level the match. Gasquet lost when he was broken for the third time in the match.