Australian Open Betting / Sean Calvert / 23 January 2009 /

Day Five in Melbourne sees two Serbs struggle, the number one seed win and perhaps farewell performances from two of the game's great characters. Sean Calvert reviews the best bits...

First up at the Hisense Arena was Juan Martin Del Potro's attempt to make the last 16 against the giant from Luxembourg, Gilles Muller.

Although the Argentine started at around [1.1], he wasn't likely to have it all his own way against a game and genuine opponent who never knows when he's beaten and so it proved.

The first set went to a breaker in stifling conditions and it was Del Potro who took an early lead at the changeover.

He was 5-4 up on serve, but an exquisite drop shot from Muller and a double fault snuffed out the chances of the world number six.

Muller served it out to take the set, but that was as good as it got for him, as a total of 62 unforced errors gave Del Potro the initiative and he toughed it out for a four set win.

The lanky Argentine is now trading at [34.0] for his first Grand Slam title, but he has a tricky one next when he faces one of my pre-tournament long shots, Marin Cilic [200.00].

The Croatian advanced to the last 16 with a straight sets win over number 11 seed David Ferrer, who seemingly still hasn't really recovered from his defeat to Kei Nishikori in the US Open last year.

Although Cilic did his job very well, he was helped by a barrage of unforced errors from Ferrer, who continues to struggle.

Another who doesn't quite look himself right now is Novak Djokovic, who was up against Bosnian-American Amer Delic.

Delic began poorly and an air shot followed by an awful backhand volley gave Djokovic the first set, but the defending champion wasn't playing well either.

In fact, he was having more success with swatting flies with his racquet than connecting properly against the ball with it and the sizable Bosnian contingent on Rod Laver erupted when Delic broke in game five of set two.

Djokovic seems to have lost the accuracy and penetration on his groundstrokes at the moment and at times he simply couldn't cope with Delic's heavy hitting.

The Serbian has also developed an annoying and somewhat patronising tendency to applaud his opponent's shots of late and this was on display again last night.

I wouldn't mind so much if he was applauding a piece of inspired brilliance from his opponent, but he does it on the most basic of plays now and I would advise him to knock that habit on the head as soon as possible.

Delic, who wouldn't even have made the main draw had it not been for another part of Nicolas Kiefer's body breaking down, served the second set out, but was soon struggling in set three.

It wasn't Djokovic's tennis that was concerning Delic though, rather a particularly rancid blister on his right foot that required a medical timeout.

The treatment helped but it was the Serbian who prevailed unimpressively in the end and as a consequence, he is now out to [9.6] for the championship.

Continuing the theme of Serbian former Grand Slam winners who are currently struggling, Ana Ivanovic was on HiSense later against Alisa Kleybanova, who without wishing to sound unkind, could do with a stylist and perhaps more importantly a fitness coach.

Yellow and purple is surely an unwise combination at the best of times. I can only assume she was trying to put Ivanovic off, but she needn't have bothered, as the number five seed was doing a great job on her own.

Her ball toss was all over the place and when serving for the first set at 5-4 she threw in a horrible double to gift the break back.

The errors kept coming from Ivanovic and soon afterwards she found herself a set and a double break down and all of a sudden she was trading at [8.0] for the match and [36.0] for the title.

This is WTA though and Kleybanova, who for my money bears a passing resemblance to a young Stephen Lee in a skirt, never looked likely to serve it out so we went to a breaker.

Ivanovic took that, but immediately went 3-0 down in the decider before clawing it back to 2-3.

She then lost her serve again after a great rally and held serve for a 5-2 lead. Would the Russian see it through at [1.22]?

She did it the very next game and in truth Kleybanova didn't need to do a great deal, as the errors kept coming from the Serbian's racquet, but it was a decent performance from her nonetheless.

Concurrently on Rod Laver, it was part 12 of Safin v Federer and it went pretty much the same way as most of the others, as Federer progressed in three and was clipped in to [2.92] in the process.

The Swiss maestro cruised the opening two sets before winning a breaker that was notable for Safin being foot-faulted at a vital time for being over the centre line.

Needless to say, Safin let the line judge know his thoughts on the matter. He will be missed if, as suggested, he quits at the end of this year.

Elsewhere in the women's singles, Jelena Jankovic, Dinara Safina and Vera Zvonareva progressed in straight sets, while Marion Bartoli and Nadia Petrova also made round four.

Andy Roddick and Tommy Robredo also enjoyed comfortable three set wins over Fabrice Santoro and Yen-Hsun Lu respectively and will now meet in the next round.

This is likely to be Santoro's last time in Melbourne in the singles and he too will be missed.

As the crowd cheered Marcos Baghdatis on to an advantage over Mardy Fish, I called it a night after another fascinating 12 hours or so of tennis action.

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