LEAD: Djokovic quietly satisfied with his improving game

By Bill Scott Nov 3, 2011, 18:37 GMT

Basle, Switzerland - Top seed Novak Djokovic needed less than an hour to reach the quarter-finals of the Swiss Indoors on Thursday as he dispatched Poland's qualifier Lukasz Kubot 6-2, 6-4.

World number one Djokovic showed marked improvement after being stretched to three sets in his opening match 48 hours earlier as he beat Xavier Malisse.

The Serb fired eight aces and broke four times against the 64th-ranked Kubot to move into a last-eight place against Marcos Baghdatis.

2009 Basle winner Djokovic is playing for the first time in six weeks due to a back injury.

'Today was a really comfortable match, I felt good on court,' said the top seed, off-court since September. 'I expected I would struggle with rhythm after not playing for so long.

'But I have no complaints with my game, it was a good performance.'

Djokovic said that while he does not expect to reach his best game this week as he works on polishing his form, he is optimistic abut doing well at the event he won in 2009 over Roger Federer.

'I want to win every match I play, I have high expectation for myself. But in some ways I need to be realistic. I don't want to get frustrated with my game. I know that I will gradually get better and that helps me.'

German Florian Mayer staged a surprise defeat of indoor king Ivan Ljubicic, beating the veteran Croatian 6-3, 6-1.

Mayer, ranked 22nd, is still carrying the confidence he gained from a third-round win over Rafael Nadal three weeks ago in Shanghai. The German broke Ljubicic five times in a match which proved to be unexpectedly easy.

'Of course I'm surprised to win like this,' said Mayer, who will next play either Swiss Stanislas Wawrinka or Dutchman Robin Haase. 'Ljubicic (who owns four indoor titles) is at home on this surface.

'I have so much confidence from beating Nadal. I know on my best game I can defeat anyone. Beating a Top four guy is great. I'm feeling fine with my tennis.'

Mayer called this season, 'the best of my career,' after finishing his win in less than an hour. 'I have a chance of getting to the Top 20 either in a few weeks or in 2012. I'm very happy with this win.'

Ljubicic had won all three previous matches between the pair, with their last in October in Beijing.

In other results, Japan's wild card Kei Nishikori reached his seventh quarter-final of the season, defeating Andreas Seppi of Italy 6-3, 7-6 (7-4).

The result was a follow up to his Shanghai quarter of last month and came after the 21-year-old put out fourth seed and year-end World Tour Finals contender Tomas Berdych in the first round.

Nishikori, the top Asian player on the ATP, improved to 34-20 on the season. He started this year with 26 career Tour-level matches between 2007-2010.

Mikhail Kukushkin of Kazakhstan beat James Blake 6-3, 6-4.