Top seeds reach Malaysian quarters

Top seeds Nicolas Almagro and Viktor Troicki both swept into the quarter-finals of the Malaysian Open in straight sets Thursday, joined by former champion Nikolay Davydenko. Almagro, seeded number one, posted a 7-6 (7/2), 7-6 (7/4) defeat of compatriot Albert Ramos, while Serbian third seed Janko Tipsarevic also put out Italian Flavio Cipolla 6-2, 6-4. Serbia's Troicki, seeded second, beat Denis Istomin of Uzbekistan 6-1, 6-4 while 2009 champion Davydenko put out Poland's Lukasz Kubot 6-3, 7-6 (7/2) indoors at the Putra stadium. Troicki, a member of the Serbian team that lost to Argentina in the Davis Cup semi-finals, earned revenge for a defeat at the hands of Istomin in the 2010 New Haven semi-finals. "I lost to him in a strange match last year. I knew I had to play more offensive and take my chances when they came," said the 15th-ranked Serb, who will next face Russian Dmitry Tursunov. "Today in the first set I played pretty well and stayed in control. The second set was equal. I was a bit more focused at the end and broke to win the match." Davydenko, who reached a career-high of three in the world rankings but has slumped to 36th, beat Kubot in just over 90 minutes, with both players struggling on serve in a match peppered with double-faults.