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Andy Murray continued his impressive return to form with a straight-sets win over Victor Hanescu at the Madrid Open.The Scot broke his Romanian opponent twice in the first set of their third-round encounter to take it 6-2.
He then won the first three games of the second set, breaking Hanescu for the third time in the match.
And the British number one broke the world number 38 once again before serving out to take the second set 6-1 claim victory in just 70 minutes.
Murray will now meet ninth seed David Ferrer, who beat Marin Cilic 6-3 6-2, in the quarter-finals, knowing he will face a much tougher test.
"It was good performance," he said after his win on Thursday.
"Hanescu isn't an out-and-out clay court player so it was a different match than you normally get, but I felt comfortable.
"I know that against the clay courters I'll have to play more aggressively and will have to improve, but in general I feel a lot better on the court."
It was the first time since Indian Wells in March that Murray has won back-to-back matches, having gone through a barren spell.
There was little doubt who would end up victorious once Murray took total control of the match against his error-prone opponent midway through the first set at La Caja Magica.
Having held his opening game, Murray established a 0-30 lead on Hanescu's serve.
However, the 6ft 6in Romanian hit back to win that game and then fashioned two break points on the next Murray serve to hint at a potentially tough evening for the third seed.
Murray, though, managed to save both of those though before establishing a 2-1 lead.
After that it was virtually all one-way traffic with Murray winning four of the next five games to take the first set.
Hanescu fought hard to hold his serve in the fourth game, but then Murray held to love before breaking his opponent in the following game.
Murray then comfortably claimed the seventh game before breaking Hanescu for a second time, winning the set when the Romanian fluffed a backhand shot down the line.
That was Hanescu's 17th unforced error in the first set, compared to just four from Murray.
Murray's dominance continued into the second set as he held serve and then immediately broke to go 2-0 up.
The next three games went with serve to leave Murray 4-1 ahead, and he ensured there would be no way back for Hanescu as he broke the 28-year-old in the sixth game after creating three break points.
Murray then held his serve to complete the win, Hanescu ending the match with yet another unforced error - his 31st, which was 23 more than his opponent made.This article is from the BBC News website. ? British Broadcasting Corporation, The BBC is not responsible for the content of external internet sites.