By Nick Georgandis
Photo Credit: Mark Howard
(March 30, 2011) What does the Sony Ericsson Open think it is? Flushing Meadows?
Plagued by long matches and rainfall, the Miami tournament echoed complaints from last year’s frequent late-night match starts on Tuesday night.
The No. 3 player in the world, Roger Federer, waited until the midnight hour, more specifically 12:37 a.m., to start his match, then quickly sent Olivier Rochus tumbling down in a 6-3, 6-1 win.
“It's happened a few times in my career where we waited around forever and I was able to play one of those clean, quick matches,” said Federer after defeating Rochus. “But, still, I prefer it not to happen every night.”
Federer will face Giles Simon in the quarterfinals, a rematch of their second-round epic at the Australian Open in which Simon had a 2-1 lead but could not hold it.
Simon outlasted Serbia’s Janko Tipsarevic, 4-6, 7-6(2), 6-2 on Tuesday night in a match that took 2-1/2 hours.
Federer and Rafael Nadal are now one win apiece away from facing each other in the tournament semifinals, something that hasn’t happened at that round of competition since the 2005 French Open.
On the women’s side of things, Maria Sharapova is back in two parts of familiar territory with her win against Alexandra Dulgheru – back in the event’s semifinals and next Monday, back in the Top 10.
Sharapova rallied to a 3-6, 7-6(6), 7-6(5) victory in a match that took three hours and 28 minutes. "It was long. It was tough. It was not my best performance, but I gutted it out until the end," Sharapova said.
"I was making too many errors and my opponent was playing really well and consistent and even though I had the lead, I never took care of it. But at the end of the day I won, so I'm really happy tonight.
The win guarantees that Sharapova, currently ranked No. 13, will rejoin the Top 10 when the next rankings are released next Monday. She’s been out of the Top 10 since February of 2009 after spending 239 consecutive weeks there.