Hosts Argentina cruised to a 2-0 lead over Kazakhstan in their Davis Cup World Group quarter-final after comfortable wins for Juan Monaco and Juan Martin del Potro.

Monaco beat Andrey Golubev 6-3 6-0 6-4 and Del Potro dispatched Mikhail Kukushkin 6-2 6-1 6-2 on clay at Parque Roca on the Buenos Aires outskirts in a tie that started a day early because of municipal elections on Sunday.

Monaco and the surface proved too difficult for Kazakh number one Golubev, who admitted his 72 unforced errors in a match lasting just over two hours were decisive. "I made too many of them," he said.

Monaco was very happy with his form.

"It was my best Davis Cup performance ever," he said. "He has his ups and downs...but I tried to play so that he could not play well, by changing the pace, hitting slow shots, proposing long rallies and attacking him on his forehand... Maybe today he made more errors than usual, but I think it's the result of my pressing him."

Former US Open champion Del Potro lived up to his reputation by securing the second point after two hours and seven minutes but he was made to work hard with the second set lasting 56 minutes.

"Maybe the 6-2 6-1 6-2 score is a bit misleading," Del Potro told a news conference. "Play was more even than it would seem to show."

The former world number four, who has struggled with injury problems recently, was happy about his return to the Davis Cup team after two years.

"Personally I enjoyed myself, those (people) hitting drums in the crowd were my friends and these are things that happen in the Davis Cup and it was fun."

Argentina have the chance to advance to the semi-finals when Eduardo Schwank and Juan Ignacio Chela take on Evgeny Korolev, whose personal coach is Argentine Gabriel Markus, and Yuriy Schukin in Thursday's doubles (1300 GMT).

Reuters