A method includes receiving a signal, which carries data in a sequence of symbols that are modulated in accordance with a pulse shape and transmitted in accordance with a timing clock. The received signal is filtered with a matched filter whose response is matched to the pulse shape of the symbols, to produce a filtered signal. The timing clock is initially recovered from the received signal prior to filtering with the matched filter. Upon meeting a predefined condition, a switch is made to recover the timing clock from the filtered signal after filtering with the matched filter. The symbols are demodulated using the recovered timing clock, so as to reconstruct the data.