Juan Martin del Potro’s bid for a maiden ATP World Tour Masters 1000 title is fast gaining momentum. Since No. 2 seed Marin Cilic’s third-round departure, the Argentine sixth seed has emerged a clear favourite to advance to his first Masters 1000 final in four years as the highest-ranked player in the bottom half of the BNP Paribas Open draw.
The 29-year-old is riding an eight-match winning streak heading into his quarter-final showdown with No. 31 seed Philipp Kohlschreiber. Del Potro – whose best result at Indian Wells was a runner-up showing in 2013 (l. to Nadal) – carries a 6-2 FedEx ATP Head2Head record into the clash, with Kohlschreiber the first German to reach the last eight in Indian Wells since tournament director Tommy Haas in 2008.
View FedEx ATP Head2Head for the 2018 BNP Paribas Open quarter-finals & vote for who you think will win!
Querrey vs Raonic | Del Potro vs Kohlschreiber
[GROUP POLL]111[/GROUP POLL]
Coming off his biggest title in five years at the ATP World Tour 500 event in Acapulco, Del Potro was romping through the Indian Wells draw until he ran into his countryman Leonardo Mayer in the fourth round. Trailing a set and a break, Del Potro looked in all sorts of trouble before he dug his way out in two hours and 30 minutes.
Kohlschreiber had not won consecutive matches this season until the BNP Paribas Open. Now he is through to his first Masters 1000 quarter-final since the 2010 Rogers Cup in Toronto. The 34-year-old sent Cilic packing before a straight-sets result over unseeded Frenchman Pierre-Hugues Herbert in the fourth round.
In a battle of the big servers, 2016 runner-up Milos Raonic takes on American Sam Querrey for the fourth semi-final berth. A former No. 3 in the ATP Rankings, Raonic had endured a slow start to his season as he made a return from a calf injury.
The Canadian – who recently started working with 2001 Wimbledon champion Goran Ivanisevic – arrived in the Californian desert with a 1-3 record for 2018. He won back-to-back matches for the first time this season over #NextGenATP compatriot Felix Auger-Aliassime and Portugal's Joao Sousa before Marcos Baghdatis of Cyprus handed him a walkover into the quarter-finals.
[ALSO LIKE]
Raonic and Querrey have split their four FedExATP Head2Head meetings but have not squared off since Raonic’s 2016 Wimbledon quarter-final victory. Querrey is through to his first Indian Wells quarter-final in 13 attempts. The No. 18 seed cruised past 28th-seeded Spaniard Feliciano Lopez in the fourth round to book his berth and will contest just his fourth Masters 1000 quarter-final (2007 Cincinnati, 2008 Monte-Carlo, 2012 Paris).
Querrey was the last man still in line to claim the $1 million bonus for winning both singles and doubles titles in Indian Wells until he and Gilles Muller lost their doubles quarter-final to Pablo Cuevas and Horacio Zeballos on Thursday.
