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Melbourne - Spain's world number three David Ferrer overcame Germany's Florian Mayer in four sets to reach the quarter-finals at the Australian Open on Sunday.
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Ferrer dropped the opening set in a tiebreaker before going on to win 6-7 (5/7), 7-5, 6-2, 6-1 in just under three hours on Hisense Arena.
It is the terrier-like Spaniard's fourth consecutive quarter-final at the Australian Open and fifth overall as he bids to better his losing semi-final appearance against Novak Djokovic last year.
The languid Mayer, who had beaten Ferrer three times in their seven previous encounters, troubled the Spaniard in the opening set.
But Ferrer progressively wore him down, hitting a total of 64 winners and claiming nine service breaks.
Once again Ferrer was rock-solid from the baseline, hitting a total of 44 forehand winners.
Ferrer will face either Czech seventh seed Tomas Berdych or 19th-seeded South African Kevin Anderson in the quarters.
Results from the Australian Open on Sunday (x denotes seeding):
Men's singles
Fourth round
David Ferrer (ESP x3) bt Florian Mayer (GER) 6-7 (5/7), 7-5, 6-2, 6-1
Novak Djokovic (SRB x2) bt Fabio Fognini (ITA x15) 6-3, 6-0, 6-2
Women's singles
Fourth round
Flavia Pennetta (ITA x28) bt Angelique Kerber (GER x9) 6-1, 4-6, 7-5
Li Na (CHN x4) bt Ekaterina Makarova (RUS x22) 6-2, 6-0
Ana Ivanovic (SRB x14) bt Serena Williams (USA x1) 4-6, 6-3, 6-3
