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Paris - Third-seeded Serbian Novak Djokovic reached the French Open quarter-finals on Monday with a 6-4, 2-6, 6-1, 6-2 win over America's Robby Ginepri, reeling off 12 of the last 15 games.
Djokovic will now tackle Jurgen Melzer, who ended Russian qualifier Teimuraz Gabashvili's run with a 7-6 (8/6), 4-6, 6-1, 6-4 win to become the first Austrian to make the last eight since former champion Thomas Muster in 1998.
The 23-year-old Djokovic, a semi-finalist in 2007 and 2008, had won all of his four previous meetings with world number 98 Ginepri, who had reached this stage after putting out 2003 champion Juan Carlos Ferrero in the third round.
He broke in the 10th game to take the opening set before Ginepri, the last American player in the men's singles, hit back to level with breaks in the third and seventh games of the second.
But that was as good as it got for Ginepri, a former US Open semi-finalist, as Djokovic dictated the remainder of the tie.
Ginepri, a former world 15, had squeezed into the main draw in Paris after enduring a traumatic year which had brought him just win on the tour and no success at all on clay.
After losing in a Bordeaux Challenger four weeks ago, the 27-year-old American then lost both matches he played at the World Team Cup in Dusseldorf.
He then had to hire a van to reach Paris accompanied by compatriot Sam Querrey who he defeated in the first round here.
The 27-year-old Ginepri said he will now head for the grasscourt season buoyed by his performances in the French capital.
"I was feeling good even after losing the first set, I thought I was dictating the rallies," said the American.
"In the third, I got broken straightaway, I took my foot off the gas and he stepped it up. He was hitting the ball deeper and it seemed that anything he tried it worked."
Meanwhile, 22nd seed Melzer ended the run of world number 114 Gabashvili, the Georgia-born Russian who put out American sixth seed Andy Roddick in the third round.
Gabashvili, who hadn't won back-to-back matches on the tour all year before Roland Garros, was hoping to be the first qualifier to reach the quarter-finals since Uruguay's Marcelo Filippini in 1999.
But Melzer, the oldest man left in the draw at 29, triumphed in five minutes short of three hours with Gabashvili's 45 unforced errors to his opponent's 27 proving decisive.
Later Monday, four-time champion Rafael Nadal tackles Brazilian 24th seed Thomaz Bellucci who he beat in the first round of Roland Garros in 2008.
The winner of that clash will face either seventh seed Fernando Verdasco or Nicolas Almagro, the 19th seed, in an all-Spanish duel.
Verdasco, who has yet to make the quarter-finals in Paris, has never lost to Almagro in three meetings.
