ATP Indian Wells Day Seven Tips

ATP Indian Wells Day Seven Tips: Schwartzman with chances in battle of clay-courters

The Indian Wells Masters moves into the fourth round stage today, with all eight matches on the schedule. Returning to preview the day ahead is our tennis columnist, Dan Weston...

De Minaur gives us a Tuesday triumph

We managed to pick up another winner yesterday with Alex De Minaur easing past Christian Garin in straight sets, on a day where there weren't any major shocks. The likes of Stefanos Tsitsipas, who came back from a set down against Fabio Fognini, and Daniil Medvedev, progressed into round two, and therefore retained their position at or towards the top of the outright market.

Norrie a slight value favourite over Paul

Moving on to today, there's not an abundance of value for round four with just one or two spots which look worth discussing. Let's make a start on those...

Tommy Paul 2.74 vs Cameron Norrie 1.56: The Brit, Norrie, is at a career-high in the world rankings and has been playing some excellent tennis of late, reaching the final of San Diego where he defeated two players in the top 15 - both as a pre-match underdog. He's definitely something of a hard court specialist - his previous final was also on hard court in Los Cabos in July, a tournament which he won without dropping a set, and he looks a very justified favourite over the American, Tommy Paul.

Paul shocked Andrey Rublev in the third round several days ago in a narrow three-setter, but on hard court in the last year, Norrie has better data on both serve and return, and this indicates the Brit has a clear advantage coming into this match. Even at the current market prices, Norrie is perhaps a few ticks too big, but it's not hugely so.

Schwartzman not without a chance in these conditions

Diego Schwartzman 3.30 vs Casper Ruud 1.43: Both players traditionally have done their best work on clay courts, so will be absolutely fine with the slower conditions than average for a hard court here at Indian Wells.

Ruud comes into the match in great form, winning all six of his main tour matches since the US Open, beating Norrie in the final of San Diego before battling past Lloyd Harris in his second match at Indian Wells.

However, I'm cautious about going overboard on this form, with 12 month hard court numbers suggesting that he should be a favourite, but not nearly as much as the market suggests.

Schwartzman is a plucky opponent and he should be able to keep things pretty close. The problem with handicap options is that this match is likely to be quite return-orientated and double-break sets are more than possible. Given this, let's go with Schwartzman to cause a decent upset and progress to the quarter-finals.