Novak Djokovic had an easy day at the office as he cruised past Juan Pablo Varillas and into a record-breaking 17th French Open quarter-final – against Karen Khachanov.
The 22-time Grand Slam champion was pushed extremely hard by Alejandro Davidovich Fokina in his previous match and struggled physically but there were no such concerns in a 6-3 6-2 6-2 win against Peruvian Varillas.
Djokovic raced into a 4-0 lead and the only time he looked in any discomfort was when Varillas won two games in a row and forced a break point in the next one.
The third seed, who criticised the crowd for booing while he took a medical time-out in his previous match, was again jeered for his reaction and cupped his hand to his ear after winning the next point.
There were plenty of cheers at the end, though, as Djokovic wrapped up the victory after an hour and 57 minutes.
A two-time champion in Paris, Djokovic has now reached the last eight in Paris for a record 17th time, one more than 14-time champion Rafael Nadal who is absent this year due to injury.
Khachanov showed good resilience to down Italian Lorenzo Sonego 1-6 6-4 7-6 (9-7) 6-1 and reach the quarter-finals for the second time.
The Russian 11th seed looked out of sorts in the opening set before finding his range on Court Suzanne Lenglen, using his forehand to devastating effect.
Sonego never recovered from wasting a 4-0 advantage in the third-set tiebreak, which proved to be the turning point of an entertaining encounter.
“After the first set and a half, I was thinking, what am I doing here, he was hitting all over the place so I decided all I could do was fight,” said the Russian, who made it to the last four in the last two Grand Slams in New York and Melbourne.
Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova fought back from the brink to earn an impressive comeback win
Anastasia Pavlyuchenkova dug deep to return to the quarter-finals for the first time since she finished as runner-up here two years ago.
Pavlyuchenkova, who was defeated in the 2021 final by Czech Barbora Krejcikova, was tested again by 28th seed Elise Mertens but rallied from a set and a break down to seal a 3-6 7-6 (7-3) 6-3 victory in a little more than three hours.
Karolina Muchova claimed a 6-4 6-3 win over Russian lucky loser Elina Avanesyan to progress to a meeting against Pavlyuchenkova.
