Melbourne - Second seed Andy Murray had his feathers ruffled but scrapped his way into the Australian Open quarter-finals with a 6-4 6-4 7-6(4) victory over local world number 17 Bernard Tomic on Monday.
The Briton, four-times a runner-up at Melbourne Park, was close to exasperation after being broken four times by the talented Australian but dug deep when it mattered to reach the last eight for the seventh year in a row.
Tomic showed flashes of the quality that has had Australia raving about his potential since his early teens but was unable to maintain the level of his performance for sufficiently long periods to cause an upset.
Murray clinched the third set tiebreak when Tomic went long with a return after two and a half hours on Rod Laver Arena to set up a quarter-final meeting with Spanish eighth seed David Ferrer.
Reuters