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Hanescu advances, Lu upset in St. Petersburg

ST. PETERSBURG, Russia - Russian wild card Dmitry Tursunov beat fourth-seeded Yen-hsun Lu of Taiwan 6-1, 6-4 to reach his second quarterfinals of the year at the St. Petersburg Open on Thursday.

Eighth-seeded Victor Hanescu of Romania also advanced by beating American qualifier Rajeev Ram 7-6 (1), 3-6, 6-3.

In beating Lu a third straight time, Tursunov didn’t lose a point on serve in the first set and broke decisively in the seventh game of the second.

“It was an easy match,” Tursunov said. “I played better on key points and tried not to give him a chance to break.

Tursunov, a six-time winner on tour and former top-20 player who has slipped to 264^th, had his third left ankle surgery in February and didn’t begin to show his old form until this month, when he reached the quarterfinals in Tokyo.

“I tried my best, but Tursunov played aggressively and didn’t give me any chances,” said Lu, who was the first Asian man to reach the Wimbledon quarterfinals this year. By winning a challenger last week, Lu was a career-high 34^th in the rankings.

In Friday’s quarterfinals, Tursunov will face Alexandr Dolgopolov, who beat German veteran and 2001 runner-up Rainer Schuettler 6-4, 6-2 to make it into his second quarterfinals in two weeks.

Ukraine’s Dolgopolov served 11 aces and never faced a break.

After splitting sets, Hanescu made a decisive break in the sixth game of the third set against Ram, and said he didn’t expect the match to be so difficult.

“Ram played very good tennis and I was lucky to win in three sets,” said Hanescu.

Illya Marchenko of Ukraine and Benjamin Becker of Germany were also second-round winners.