Germany’s Tommy Haas returns the ball to Slovakia’s Miloslav Mecir during their second round match as part of the Vienna ATP 250 tennis tournament held in Vienna, yesterday. (AFP)

AFP/Vienna

Former champion Tommy Haas saw off qualifier Miloslav Mecir Jr 7-5, 7-6 (10/8) yesterday to reach the Austrian Open quarter-finals.
The 25-year-old Slovak qualifier is the son of former number four Miloslav Mecir, the 1988 Olympic champion who also reached the 1986 US Open and 1989 Australian Open finals.
Second seed Haas, 35, is playing the Vienna event for the 11th time, having won the title in 2001 and now stands at 12-9 at the Stadthalle.
But the win, in just under two hours, was far from simple for Haas, who withdrew last week in Shanghai before his third-round match with back pain.
The German had to save a set point in the opener before finally winning 7-5 in three quarters of an hour.
Haas needed to battle to close out the match, missing on two match points through a double-fault and a forehand error.
The 240th-ranked Mecir, whose opening-round win was his first at the ATP level, had two set points before Haas finished off the job on his third match point.
Mecir is the second son of a former top 10 player to win an ATP match in 2013. In July it happened to Emilio Gomez, whose father is 1990 Roland Garros champion Andres Gomez, at the tournament in Quito.
The younger Mecir told the ATP that he takes after his smooth-hitting father on court.
“I’ve been told that I have a pretty similar playing style to my father. I can adjust my style dependent on who I play. I can take the ball early, especially on hard courts, and I also have the ability to finish points without my opponent making a mistake,” he explained.
Italian third seed Fabio Fognini began with a victory over Pole Lukas Kubot 7-5, 6-2 while Robin Haase defeated seventh seed Vasek Pospisil 7-6 (7/3), 6-7 (5/7), 6-2.
French top seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga was starting his campaign later against German Daniel Brands.

Stosur beats Alice Cornet in Kremlin Cup

Samantha Stosur extended her winning streak to seven matches by beating Alize Cornet 6-4 6-1 in the second round of the Kremlin Cup yesterday.
The seventh-seeded Australian, who won her second title of the season last Sunday in Osaka, won five consecutive games to win the first set and go 2-0 up in the second.
Stosur, a runner-up here last season, will play a quarter-final against fourth-seeded Serbian Ana Ivanovic who beat Czech Klara Zakopalova 6-3 6-1.
Meanwhile quarter-finalist Alisa Kleybanova says she is thrilled to be back playing on her home courts in Moscow after battling with cancer.
The Russian 24-year-old reached her first quarter-final since treatment for Hodgkin’s Lymphoma, a form of cancer, when defeating sixth seeded Spaniard Carla Suarez Navarro 7-6 (7-2) 6-4 in the joint ATP and WTA Kremlin Cup.
“I was very excited to be back here in Moscow because it’s been a long time that I’ve been waiting to play this tournament,” Kleybanova said after missing out in 2011 and 2012.
The winner of two WTA titles added: “I’m really happy with how I dealt with all the stress - I actually felt really good out there and that’s one of the reasons I was able to hold myself together in such a tough match and actually play some good tennis.”
Kleybanova said that she was very touched after discovering how many people wrote her letters of support when she was fighting cancer.