Tennis (ATP Tour)

David Nalbandian (Agrentina) has advanced to the quarterfinals of the Telecom Italia Masters Tournament in Rome, Italy.

Nalbandyan's game is improving.

On the clay surface, Nalbandian (seeded No. 5), defeated Sweden’s Robin Soderling (6-4, 6-4), Flavio Saretta of Brazil (6-2, 6-4) and Filippo Volandri of Italy (7-6 (4), 3-6, 6-4). He will now face Vincent Spadea (USA).

Nalbandian came to Italy from the Seat Godo International Series Gold tournament in Barcelona, Spain where he lost in the quarterfinals to Kristof Vliegen of Belgium, 6-7 (1), 4-6. In Spain Nalbandian earned 15 race points and $22,325. He moved from 39 to 27 in ATP rankings.

Armenia ’s Sargis Sargsyan’s week was not as successful. The Yerevan native was ousted in the first round of the Rome tournament. He currently holds 71 st place in ATP.

Chess (FIDE rankings)

The latest FIDE Top 100 chess players again includes four grandmasters of Armenia.

At No. 21 (2689 points) Vladimir Hakobyan remains the best chess player of Armenia, although he dropped two places in overall standings.

Hakobyan is followed by Rafael Vahanyan (2639 points), who jumped from 74 th to 54 th place within four months passing Smbat Lputyan, who lost two positions and now takes 60 th place with 2634 points.

Finally, Gabriel Sargsyan completes the list of Armenians with 2614 points, 89 th place. Sargsyan moved down 11 positions from the January postings.

The world’s best, Garry Kasparov has 2817 points.

Armenian women's chess has only one representative in FIDE list of best 50 women chess players. Grandmaster Elina Danielyan takes 37 th place (she moved down 5 positions since January) in the rankings with 2418 points.