Indian Wells (USA), March 3 (IANS) Spanish star Carlos Alcaraz, the reigning Australian Open winner and top seed, will face a tricky test when he steps onto the court for his opening match of the BNP Paribas Open at Indian Wells.

The No. 1 player in the ATP Rankings will open the season’s first ATP Masters 1000 event against former World No. 3 Grigor Dimitrov or surging lefty Terence Atmane, with five-time Indian Wells champion Novak Djokovic looming in his half of the draw.

Alcaraz played Dimitrov in the California desert last year, losing just two games to the Bulgarian in the fourth round. But Dimitrov has shown comfort at Indian Wells, reaching the semi-finals in 2021 and the quarter-finals in 2022.

Atmane, on the other hand, will be making his main draw debut at Indian Wells after previously competing in qualifying. The Frenchman broke through last year in Cincinnati with a dream run to the semi-finals and is at a career-high No. 52 in the ATP Rankings. The 24-year-old has split two previous ATP head-to-head meetings with Dimitrov, including a straight-sets victory last week in Acapulco.

“It’s amazing. I’ll have hopefully two very good matches going on. We’re going to stay focused on the first one,” Atmane told ATP Tour on Tuesday. “It’s always fun. We played with Grigor last week, so we play again. It’s very funny. The winner of one of us is going to be able to play Carlitos. It’s going to be very much up [in the air] for both of us, so it’s going to be very interesting.”

Djokovic, who is tied with Roger Federer for the most titles in tournament history (5), will play Kamil Majchrzak or Giovanni Mpetshi Perricard in his first match since the Australian Open final. The Serbian suffered a stunning opening defeat here to Botic van de Zandschulp last year and will try to make a good start on his chase to a 102nd tour-level title.

Seventh seed Taylor Fritz, the 2022 Indian Wells champion, is also in Djokovic’s quarter of the draw. The top-ranked American opens against Damir Dzumhur or Jacob Fearnley.

Second seed Jannik Sinner is chasing his first title in the desert and is in the same quarter as eighth seed Ben Shelton, who brings momentum to California after winning the Dallas title. Sinner takes on James Duckworth or a qualifier in the second round.

–IANS

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