Venus Williams and Ana Ivanovic thundered into the Australian Open quarter finals and Roger Federer overcame his second stern test of the tournament to reach the last eight on Monday.

Lleyton Hewitt’s tournament hit the buffers, however, Australia’s remaining hope skidding out 7-5, 6-3, 6-3 to third seed Novak Djokovic.

While Wimbledon champion Williams and fourth seed Ivanovic made light work of their opposition, world number one Federer was again made to fight hard to defend his title. Pushed to five sets on Saturday, he prevailed 6-4, 7-6, 6-3 against 13th seed Tomas Berdych but did not have things all his own way. Next up for the Swiss is American James Blake who reached his first Grand Slam quarter final outside the United States with a solid 6-3, 6-4, 6-4 victory over Croatia’s Marin Cilic.

While Federer put Saturday’s epic behind him, Hewitt was unable to bounce back from his five-set third-round thriller.

The former world number one took until 4:33 am on Sunday morning to oust Marcos Baghdatis and failed to rouse himself for the Djokovic challenge.

Serbian Djokovic overcame a nervy start to clinch victory in two hours, 26 minutes and set up a last-eight clash with fifth seed David Ferrer of Spain. “In the first set I was lucky, but then afterwards I relaxed and tried to be aggressive and take control of the match,” Djokovic said.

Ferrer beat Juan Carlos Ferrero 7-5, 3-6, 6-4 6-1 to reach the last eight. “I beat Juan Carlos playing very well, it was a very tough match,” Ferrer told reporters.

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