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Rafael Nadal recorded his 400th victory in a masters tournament. The 21-time Grand Slam champion reached the fourth round of Indian Wells, also known as the fifth Grand Slam tournament, at the expense of Briton Dan Evans: 7-5 6-3.
“I didn’t know anything about that, but of course those are nice numbers,” said Nadal, 35, still undefeated this year. He already has 17 victories in 2022.
Against Evans, Nadal led 4-2 but won eight of the next nine games. After an hour and 43 minutes, he finished with a convincing love game.
Nadal, seeded fourth, is the highest ranked player remaining in the tournament. First-seeded Russian Daniil Medvedev lost in straight sets to Frenchman Gael Monfils and Alexander Zverev, the third-seeded German, had to admit his superiority earlier over American Tommy Paul. Novak Djokovic, who would have been seeded second, withdrew just before the tournament as the Serb would not be allowed to enter the United States unvaccinated.
The Greek Stefanos Tsitsipas, seeded fifth, was surprised by the American Jenson Brooksby after a good start. It was 1-6 6-3 6-2 for the world number 43, who had already left Karen Khachanov without a chance in the previous round.
A year ago, Brooksby, 21, was still outside the top 250. “You never know at that point what’s going to happen. You can’t predict the future, but the only thing you can do is what you can control. I knew in my mind that I had the game to be here and there’s nothing nicer than delivering it here,” said Brooksby, who has never beaten a player in the top 5 in the world before.
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