DUBAI, March 6: Andy Murray earned a tortured 6-3, 3-6, 7-6 victory over Fernando Verdasco to reach the quarter-finals of the Dubai Championships on Wednesday.

Australian Open winner Novak Djokovic was also stretched before the third seeded Serbian beat Fabrice Santoro of France 6-3, 7-6, but Rafael Nadal coasted to a 6-4, 6-0 win over Russian qualifier Mikhail Ledovskikh.

Anyone expecting Murray to sail past the Spanish left-hander after he had earlier beaten Roger Federer was disappointed.

The Briton had to battle both the wind and an adventurous opponent for almost two and a half hours before securing victory on his fourth match point.

Federer had accused Murray of often waiting for his opponent to make errors rather than going for winners and the Scot was guilty of that for most of the match. Verdasco was by far the more aggressive player but he lack1ed consistency on his powerful forehand.

Murray looked flat at the start and it was only when he faced a break point at 2-2 that he jerked into life and began to compete more aggressively. He then broke for 4-2 when his opponent double-faulted and, after holding off two more break points in the next game, went on to take the set.

A break for 2-0 and two break points saved in the next game gave Verdasco a 3-0 lead in the second set and, although Murray recovered the break in the seventh game, Verdasco broke once more for 5-3.

In the final set, Murray held off two break points at 1-1, broke for 4-2 but then netted a forehand to concede his serve in the next game.

Verdasco held a break point at 5-5 but netted a volley, before Murray controlled the tiebreak, building a 6-2 lead before closing out the match by winning a protracted rally.

Wednesday’s results (prefix number denotes seeding):

Second round: 6-Andy Roddick (US) bt Paul-Henri Mathieu (France) 6-3, 6-4; 3-Novak Djokovic (Serbia) bt Fabrice Santoro (France) 6-3, 7-6 (7-3); Igor Andreev (Russia) bt 7-Richard Gasquet (France) 6-3, 6-4; 2-Rafael Nadal (Spain) bt Mikhail Ledovskikh (Russia) 6-4, 6-0; 4-David Ferrer (Spain) bt Olivier Rochus (Belgium) 3-6, 7-5, 6-1; Feliciano Lopez (Spain) bt 8-Tomas Berdych (Czech Republic) 6-2, 7-5; Andy Murray (Britain) bt Fernando Verdasco (Spain) 6-3, 3-6 7-6 (7-5); 5-Nikolay Davydenko (Russia) bt Jan Hernych (Czech Republic) 6-1, 6-4.

—Reuters