Four-times champion Andre Agassi steamed into the last 16 of the Australian Open tennis after taming the serve-volley power of American compatriot Taylor Dent in Melbourne on Friday.
The 34-year-old eighth seed, in the same top half of the draw as raging tournament favourite Roger Federer, extinguished 29th-seeded Dent’s hopes with a 7-5, 7-6 (7/3), 6-1 win in one hour and 52 minutes on Rod Laver Arena.
Agassi will play either 11th-seeded Swede Joachim Johansson or 24th-seeded Spaniard Feliciano Lopez in Sunday’s fourth round.
The eight-times grand-slam winner broke Dent’s serve eight times and committed only six unforced errors as Dent ran himself into the court making a total of 136 net approaches in the three sets.
There were five service breaks in the opening set, but Agassi got three of them to go one-up after 40 minutes.
Dent made 48 net approaches in his serve-volley style but his game looked ragged early in the second set as Agassi broke his serve in the third game.
However, Dent recovered and broke back to 3-3 as he forced Agassi into errors.
Dent was taken to six deuces in the 11th game but survived Agassi’s assault and the set went into a tiebreaker.
Agassi, the oldest man in this year’s Open men’s singles, had control of the tiebreaker and got to three set points before wrapping up the set with a rasping backhand pass.
Dent had little to offer in the third set and his serve was broken three times as Agassi surged to victory.
It was Agassi’s fourth win in as many meetings against Dent, who completed the match after being forced to retire with injuries in both their previous grand slam meetings in the first round of Wimbledon 2000 and the round of 16 at the 2003 US Open.
Agassi is on track to face Federer in the quarterfinals next week.
Agassi is contesting his 57th career grand slam event at the Australian Open, joining Michael Chang, Jimmy Connors, Wayne Ferreira and Ivan Lendl in a five-way tie for the most slam events played in the Open Era (post-1969). — Sapa-AFP