Ferrero overcomes giant Johansson
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Ferrero now faces unseeded Romanian Andre Pavel
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MELBOURNE, Australia -- French Open champion Juan Carlos Ferrero toiled for four sets before overcoming Swedish giant Joachim Johansson in the third round of the Australian Open in Melbourne.
The world number three finished strongly after losing the third set in a tiebreaker to win 6-1 7-6 (7/4) 6-7 (5/7) 6-4.
Argentine Guillermo Canas battered Britain's Tim Henman 6-7 5-7 7-6 7-5 9-7 in a thrilling clash.
Ferrero, who reached the quarter-finals here last year, will now play unseeded Romanian Andrei Pavel in the round of 16 on Monday.
Ferrero was impressed with Johansson's improvement since he saw him as a junior three years ago. "I see some good changes in him, the serve and a very good forehand, but maybe he has to improve mistakes on important points," Ferrero said.
Johansson made a welter of unforced errors, 52 to 17 and served up seven double-faults.
Ferrero said he was not troubled by forearm and back problems which surfaces in his last match with Italian Filippo Volandri.
Ferrero started strongly, dropping only one game but 21-year-old big-serving Johansson, who clocked a top speed of 225 kph (140mph), got more into the match and won the third set tiebreaker.
Ferrero broke Johansson's serve in the seventh game of the fourth set to go on and clinch the match in two hours 28 minutes.
Clean winners
Henman struck an astonishing 100 clean winners, the equivalent of 25 games, but Canas hit the one that counted, a rocket-like forehand past the advancing Briton on his third match point.
Canas's reward for his superb comeback was a fourth round meeting with compatriot and eighth seed David Nalbandian.
Striking the Canas serve early and drifting stealthily into the net, Henman took the attack to the Argentine from the start of the contest.
When the Briton was pinned to the baseline, his groundstrokes were full-blooded and for the first two sets Henman kept his nose in front, picking off volleys and stroking the ball away for winners.
But Canas, out for most of last year with an injured hand, had won the last three times the pair played and was far from finished.
He roared back, reeling off the next two sets with some thunderous hitting which left Henman stunned.
Cheered on by a packed Margaret Court Arena, both players threw all they had at each other with Henman charging the net and Canas launching groundstrokes from behind the baseline.
The Briton grabbed the advantage early in the final set, stretching into a 4-1 lead. But Canas broke back with two running passes to even things up.
With the pressure beginning to tell, Henman dropped serve to trail 8-7 when he hit his ninth double fault of the match.
He held off two match points, the second with his 100th clean winner, before Canas flourished his fearsome forehand one final time.
