Andy Murray breezed through to the fourth round of the Australian Open with a 6-3, 6-4, 7-5 win over Lithuanian qualifier Ricardas Berankis. The third seeded tennis player now faces Gilles Simons who moved to the fourth round with a 6-4, 6-4, 4-6, 1-6, 8-6 win over 86th seeded Gael Monfils.
The scoreline of the Andy Murray - Ricardas Berankis match reveals little of what the game really was. It took Murray 2hr 12min to finish the match. While the first set was not all that difficult, he trailed by a break of serve in the second set and appeared to be losing his game at various points in the game Murray served for the match at 5-4 in the third set but Berankis, the world number 110, broke back. But the 22-year-old dropped his next service game and Murray made no mistake in his second attempt at closing the victory.
"I was struggling," Murray said. "He (Berankis) was making me feel pretty frustrated. We know each other well and we have practised together. He was making me feel pretty uncomfortable out there."
Meanwhile Gilles Simons, though through to the next round, wasn't very pleased with his performance. It took him 5 sets to secure his win over 86th seeded Gael Monfils. Now Simons faces Murray and is definitely worried about the game.
"I don't have to explain to you how strong he is," he said. "Of course it will be really, really difficult, but at the moment I just happy that I won the last one, and I will just try to go and take my chance. It is my job to go on the court and to do the maximum to bother him and to give him a hard time."
Simons and Murray have played against each other 10 times in the past and Murray has been the winner in 9 of those occasions.
Meanwhile, the Australian Open is looking forward to the all-Spanish quarter-final between David Ferrer and Nicolas Almagro.
