Anderson, Djokovic sail through to Rogers quarter-finals

South Africa’s top ranked player, Kevin Anderson, has advanced to both the men’s singles and doubles quarter-finals of the Rogers Cup tennis tournament in Toronto, Canada.

The third seeded Anderson beat qualifier, Ilya Ivashka of Belarus in straight sets in their third round encounter.

Anderson, together with his double’s partner, Novak Djokovic, then defeated defending champions, Nicolas Mahut and Pierre-Hugues Herbert of France to reach the last eight in the doubles.

Anderson, who needed three sets to beat unseeded Russian Evgeny Donskoy in his first match, beat the Belarusian 7-5, 6-3.

While the first set had to be decided by a tiebreaker, the 32-year-old Anderson played much better in the second, winning it comfortably to seal victory. He will face Bulgarian fifth-seed Grigor Dimitrov later this evening for a spot in the semi-final.

Anderson later continued his doubles success with partner Novak Djokovic. They knocked out defending champions, Mahut and Herbert. Anderson and Djokovic lost the first set 6-4, before winning the second 6-4. They then won the deciding match tie-breaker 10-7 to record a famous victory.

Unlike Anderson who is competing on two fronts, Djokovic is now only competing in the doubles after he was stunned by Greek teenager, Stefanos Tsitsipas.

The 19-year-old beat the reigning Wimbledon champion 6-3, 6-7, 6-3. And world number one Rafael Nadal fought off a spirited challenge from Switzerland’s Stan Wawrinka to also reach the last eight.

The Spaniaerd clinched the match on his second match point with a forehand cross court return for a 7-5, 7-6 victory.

Nadal will face Croatian Marin Cilic in the last of the quarter-final matches on Friday.