The last 16 of the BNP Paribas Open concludes on Wednesday as the ATP Indian Wells competition plays down to the quarter final stage and at the end of the action we will know the eight players competing for the opening Masters 1000 title of the season.
The tournament is still reeling from the shock defeat of Novak Djokovic in the previous round and his absence will be particular felt on Wednesday as it is his half of the draw that is on show. That leaves Daniil Medvedev as the main act.
Stadium 1
We have to wait for a couple of women’s matches to be played out before the men take to the court over on Stadium 1. When they do they finish off the day session and then open up the night session with the first match seeing the highest ranked player on show in Daniil Medvedev going up against a Grigor Dimitrov who is having a decent season. The American number one is the main attraction in the night match when the former champion Taylor Fritz looks to continue his love affair with this place when he goes up against Holger Rune in a potential firecracker of a game.
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Stadium 2
The other two men’s matches come along over on Stadium 2 where in order to avoid a clash between any of the games involving the men it is the opening two matches on the schedule that we are interested in. The first one sees Casper Ruud looking to continue his good recent form against a Gael Monfils who has looked quite dangerous in the tournament so far. The second game will then see the American number two Tommy Paul take on Luca Nardi, the lucky loser who has made full use of his second chance in the tournament and caused shockwaves through the Indian Wells complex when he dumped out Novak Djokovic in the previous round.
Betting
I’m not convinced that Gael Monfils will beat Casper Ruud given the amount of time that he has had on court in this tournament but I do expect him to lay down a serious challenge to the Norwegian when they open up the show over on Stadium 2. Ruud has won both of his matches this week pretty comfortably but that isn’t always a good thing because he is sure to be tested here. I say he’s won both comfortably but he only won 64 76 in his first game against world number 141 Lukas Klein and clearly ‘La Monf’ is an upgrade on that.
I suspect Monfils is being written off a little in this match because he needed more than three hours to see off Cameron Norrie in a gruelling clash on Monday but he’s had a day off since then and I would be surprised if he isn’t competitive enough, at least in the first couple of sets here. What that Norrie match showed us was that Monfils is prepared to dig in and give his all for the cause and that is the sort of effort I like my cash to be following. You can get a 3.5 game start on the handicap for the Frenchman and I think that is high enough as I expect him to take a set at the very least.
Tips
Back G.Monfils (+3.5 games) to beat C.Ruud for a 3/10 stake at 1.85 with William Hill
Back him here:
