Andy Murray was forced to three sets in his Los Angeles debut, beating American qualifier Tim Smyczek 6-1, 4-6, 6-2 Thursday in a second-round match at the Farmers Classic. Murray's quarterfinal opponent will be Alejandro Falla of Colombia, who beat No. 5 seed Ernests Gulbis of Latvia, 4-6, 6-3, 7-6 (10). “I hope to have a good run here,” Murray said. “There were a lot of long rallies in the first and second sets.” Fourth-seeded Feliciano Lopez of Spain beat Dudi Sela of Israel 7-6 (7), 6-4. In the quarters, Lopez will play wild-card James Blake, who outlasted Benjamin Becker 7-5, 7-6 (7) at the Los Angeles Tennis Center . Blake, a finalist here in 2007, improved to 3-0 against the German. Bartoli advances Holder Marion Bartoli advanced to the quarterfinals of the Stanford Classic on Thursday with a 6-3, 6-4 win over former world No. 1 Ana Ivanovic, while Maria Sharapova also advanced to the last eight. Russian Sharapova beat Belarus's Olga Govortsova 6-3, 6-3 while Maria Kirilenko defeated sixth seed Shahar Peer 6-4, 6-3. American teenager Melanie Oudin lost 6-3, 6-1 to eighth seed Victoria Azarenka. Chela stuns Davydenko Juan Ignacio Chela of Argentina routed a lackluster Nikolay Davydenko 6-2, 6-1 Friday to reach the semifinals of the Croatia Open, as the three top-seeded players were all eliminated. The top-seeded Davydenko only held serve once against Chela, who will next play Potito Starace of Italy. Starace beat third-seeded Ivan Ljubicic of Croatia 6-4, 7-6 (6), while No. 2 Jurgen Melzer of Austria lost 6-1, 6-1 to Andreas Seppi of Italy. Davydenko has not won conescutive matches since returning to the tour in June after recovering from a wrist injury. “I didn't play as I can play,” Davydenko said. “Chela just hit the ball back, I tried to do something but it didn't work.” Seppi will face Juan Carlos Ferrero in the semis for the second straight year, after the fourth-seeded Spaniard beat No. 6 Alexandr Dolgopolov of Ukraine 6-1, 6-2. Melzer played the quarterfinal just hours after his second-round match – a 6-1, 6-0 rout of Jan Hajek of the Czech Republic – which was postponed from Thursday because of torrential rain. Youzhny upset Top-seeded Mikhail Youzhny lost to 147th-ranked Yuri Schukin of Kazakhstan in the Swiss Open quarterfinals. The 31-year-old Schukin, who came through qualifying, reached his first career semifinal by defeating the 14th-ranked Russian 6-4, 2-6, 7-5 Friday. Schukin will play seventh-seeded Frenchman Richard Gasquet in Saturday's semifinals. Gasquet, the 2006 champion on Gstaad's outdoor clay, beat fourth-seeded Albert Montanes of Spain 7-6 (5), 6-4. Two Spaniards will meet in the other semifinal. Second-seeded Nicolas Almagro beat Jeremy Chardy of France, 6-2, 7-6 (5), and Daniel Gimeno-Traver had an easy 6-2, 6-4 victory over Igor Andreev from Russia. Groth topples Dushevina Jarmila Groth of Australia defeated defending champion Vera Dushevina of Russia 7-5, 6-2 Friday in the quarterfinals of the Istanbul Cup. Groth converted four of her five break points, using strong returns to dominate the second set. Third-seeded Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova also reached the semifinals by beating Sorana Cirstea of Romania 6-4, 6-2, while fellow Russian Elena Vesnina ousted Anastasia Rodionova of Australia 7-5, 6-1 and sixth-seeded Andrea Petkovic of Germany beat Elena Baltacha of Britain 6-4, 6
