Tennis: Hewitt retires hurt in Marseille

MARSEILLE, France, Feb 15 (Reuters) Former world number one Lleyton Hewitt retired injured from his second round match with France's Gilles Simon at the Marseille Open today.

Simon now faces a quarter-final match against Swede Jonas Bjorkman, who beat Italy's Andrea Seppi 6-1 6-0 in 52 minutes.

Australian Hewitt, seeded eighth, was losing 6-1 3-2 when he pulled out with a thigh injury.

''I could stand the pain less and less,'' he told reporters.

''It got really awful at the end of the first set. I was worn out after the Davis Cup matches,'' he added.

Hewitt played two five set matches against Belgium last weekend, losing to Kristof Vliegen before beating Olivier Rochus.

Earlier, France's Julien Benneteau recovered to beat Spanish fifth seed David Ferrer 4-6 6-0 6-1 and reach the last eight.

Unseeded Benneteau, who reached the French Open quarter-finals last year, won seven out of eight break points to wrap up the win in one hour and 39 minutes.

The Frenchman, 43rd in the world rankings, now meets Finn Jarkko Nieminen, who beat France's Nicolas Mahut 6-4 3-6 6-3.

Big-serving Robin Soederling won an all-Swedish clash against Thomas Johansson 6-4 7-5 to set up a quarter-fdinal with either French number one Richard Gasquet, seeded sixth, or his compatriot Marc Gicquel who meet later today.

Reuters AD VP0208