Novak Djokovic and Gilles Simon advanced into the Shanghai quarterfinals. Djokovic had an easy time dismissing German veteran, Rainer Schuettler 6-4 6-2. The Serb has quietly been advancing through the draw and looks, by far, the most solid of all the players in the field.

On the other side, Gilles Simon had no trouble with the usually problematic Tomas Berdych. He topped the Czech 6-3 6-4 after 90 minutes of play. Both players had been battling injuries this week, but the Frenchman was able to pull this one out.

Simon will meet Djokovic next. The second-seed looks good and leads their head-to-head 3-1. All meetings were on hard surfaces with the Serb winning the last three. It should be a good matchup tomorrow.

(Images: AP)

France's Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and Team Germany at the Player's Night at the ARAG World Team Championship in Dusseldorf, Germany.

(Image: ARAG ATP World Team Championship)

City: Houston, Texas, USA
Surface: Outdoor Clay
Championship Points: 250
2008 Singles Champion: Marcel Granollers
2008 Doubles Champions: Ernest Gulbis/Rainer Schuettler

Marcel Granollers will be on hand to defend his title. James Blake, Mardy Fish and Lleyton Hewitt will also be there. The tournament is on clay, so there will probably be no trouble from them. Look for Jeremy Chardy to cause a little bit of trouble in the top part of the draw. Also, there is always a possibility that Guillermo Canas could awake from his tennis slumber and surprise someone.

Ernest Gulbis and Rainer Schuettler will not defend their title. The Bryan Brothers, Fisher/Kerr, Ker/Damm and Huss/Hutchins will all be in the mix. Parrott/Polasek are having a good year, but Filip Polasek is not playing in the tournament. Travis Parrott is instead teamed up with the big, serving John Isner. This pairing could be interesting.

Tournament Draw
Singles / Doubles

Monday’s Matches
Qualifying Third Round
Donald Young (USA) vs. Scoville Jenkins (USA)
Michael Russell (USA) vs. Filip Krajinovic (SRB)
Alexander Peya (AUT) vs. Jesse Levine (USA)
Amer Delic (USA) vs. Giovanni Lapentti (ECU)

Singles First Round
3 Juergen Melzer (AUT) vs. Robert Kendrick (USA)
8 Maximo Gonzalez (ARG) vs. Daniel Gimeno-Traver (ESP)
Wayne Odesnik (USA) vs. Kevin Anderson (RSA)
Evgeny Korolev (RUS) vs. Leonardo Mayer (ARG)

Doubles First Round
D. Martin (USA)/S. Querrey (USA) vs. J. Isner (USA)/T. Parrott (USA)
J. Blake (USA)/M. Fish (USA) vs. A. Delic (USA)/R. Kendrick (USA)

Monday’s Order of Play

(Image: Emily Jaschke)