Aus Open: Djokovic powers into quarters

Melbourne:

Serbian third seed Novak Djokovic powered into the Australian Open quarter-finals with an emphatic 6-1, 6-2, 7-5 win over Poland's unseeded Lukasz Kubot on Monday.

Kubot, ranked 86th in the world, had been gifted a spot in the fourth round by the withdrawal of Russian 20th seed Mikhail Youzhny from their third round clash, and found Djokovic far too good.

Djokovic struggled with his form a little in the opening two rounds, but has gone up a gear since and is back in the sort of dominant touch he displayed in the second half of last year.

His next opponent will be either French 10th seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga or Spanish 26th seed Nicolas Almagro, with Djokovic keen to bury the memories of last year's quarter-final, when he retired against Andy Roddick due to fatigue.

The 2008 Australian Open champion dropped just four games to Uzbekistan's Denis Istomin in the third round and came out firing against Kubot, a 27-year-old in just his third Grand Slam.

With new coach Todd Martin watching appreciatively, Djokovic broke Kubot in the fourth and sixth games of the first set, and then achieved another two breaks in the second set.

The Serb again broke in the fifth game of the third set and a quick victory loomed, but the Pole showed some fight by breaking back immediately, holding his own serve for a 4-3 lead and then taking Djokovic to deuce in his next service game.

However, Djokovic broke again in the 11th game and easily held serve to seal the win.