It is rare these days Roger Federer has a score to settle with an opponent he has lost to and never beaten before. The defending BNP Paribas Open champion will earn that chance on Saturday when he takes on Federico Delbonis in the second round.

Federer trails the pair’s FedEx ATP Head2Head ledger 0-1 after the Argentine prevailed on clay in Hamburg in 2013. Delbonis advanced to the second-round showdown after he saved two match points to deny American Ryan Harrison in three sets.

Much like their lone prior encounter, the No. 67 in the ATP Rankings will look to dictate play with his powerful lefty forehand against the five-time Indian Wells champion. Delbonis’s best result came two years ago when he stunned then No. 2 Andy Murray to reach the fourth round.

Federer is contesting his 450th match at ATP World Tour Masters 1000 level, having compiled a 350-99 record. He is bidding for a record sixth BNP Paribas Open title – his 28th Masters 1000 crown – and arrives having reclaimed the No. 1 ATP Ranking with his 97th ATP World Tour title in Rotterdam.

Should the Swiss bow out before the semi-finals, though, he will relinquish the No. 1 ranking to Rafael Nadal. Federer is undefeated in 2018 having also successfully defended his Australian Open crown in January.

The man Federer defeated for the title in Rotterdam, Nitto ATP Finals champion Grigor Dimitrov, will open his Indian Wells campaign on Saturday against talented Spanish lefty Fernando Verdasco. In a match sure to fill the Hot Shots reels, Dimitrov will carry a 2-1 FedEx ATP Head2Head record into the match but the pair hasn’t met since 2015.

Dimitrov is coming off a surprise opening loss to Malek Jaziri in Dubai, while Verdasco fell in the opening round in Acapulco to Diego Schwartzman. Former World No. 7 Verdasco also lost to Schwartzman in the final of the Rio Open in the week before.

Opening the day’s play on Stadium 1, it will be a battle of the single-handed backhands when Austrian No. 5 seed Dominic Thiem meets #NextGenATP Greek player Stefanos Tsitsipas for the second time. Thiem prevailed in two tight sets in the quarter-finals in Doha in January but saw enough in his opponent to suggest the 19-year-old could rise to at least the Top 20 in the ATP Rankings. Tsitsipas took down Moldovan Radu Albot in his opening match.

In an all-#NextGenATP showdown, American Taylor Fritz will square off for the first time against Russian World No. 27 Andrey Rublev for a place in the third round. Fritz saved a match point in his opening match against his groomsman, #NextGenATP American Reilly Opelka. Rublev started the year with a runner-up showing in Doha while Fritz owns a 14-3 record on the ATP Challenger Tour this season.

A year ago, Uruguay’s Pablo Cuevas held match two match points at the BNP Paribas Open before falling to Pablo Carreno Busta in a quarter-final thriller. On Saturday, the No. 30 seed faces a stern test in his 2018 Indian Wells opener against #NextGenATP Canadian Denis Shapovalov.

The 18-year-old Shapovalov cruised past Lithuanian Ricardas Berankis in his first-round match. Both are coming off recent semi-final runs, with Cuevas reaching the last four at last week’s Sao Paulo Open on clay and Shapovalov progressing as far on hard court at the Delray Beach Open in late February.

Former World No. 6 Gael Monfils headlines action at the BNP Paribas Open on Friday, which also includes the start of doubles play. Three players in the Top 10 of the ATP Rankings – No. 4-ranked Grigor Dimitrov, No. 6 Dominic Thiem and No. 8 Juan Martin del Potro – also feature in the doubles competition.

View FedEx ATP Head2Head for the 2018 BNP Paribas Open 1R & vote for who you think will win! 
 Monfils v Ebden | Tiafoe v Escobedo | Mayer v Estrella Burgos

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Monfils, who is competing after four straight weeks on the clay of the Latin American swing, plays as a non-seed at the ATP World Tour Masters 1000 tournament for the first time since 2008. The Frenchman, winner of this year’s Qatar ExxonMobil Open crown (d. Rublev) and a 2016 quarter-finalist, takes on Australia’s Matthew Ebden – playing in Indian Wells for the first time since 2014 – in the first match on Stadium 1.

In other first-round ties, former World No. 8 Gilles Simon – a two-time ATP World Tour Masters 1000 finalist at the 2008 and 2014 Rolex Shanghai Masters, meets fellow Frenchman Pierre-Hugues Herbert. Another former World No. 8 and 2006 quarter-finalist Marcos Baghdatis faces Yoshihito Nishioka, while former No. 12 Viktor Troicki challenges Marton Fucsovics.

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Three #NextGenATP players, American Frances Tiafoe – the Delray Beach Open title – Canadian qualifier Felix Auger-Aliassime and Australian wild card Alex de Minaur – are all worth watching on day two.

Ernesto Escobedo has beaten his fellow American Tiafoe in third set tie-breaks in their two 2016 meetings on the ATP Challenger Tour, and recently recorded his first Top 10 win over No. 10-ranked Jack Sock at the Abierto Mexicano Telcel presentado por HSBC. But Tiafoe, 20, is riding on the crest of a wave after lifting his first ATP World Tour trophy in Delray Beach on 25 February.

In the fourth match on Stadium 2, Canadian qualifier and former World No. 25 Vasek Pospisil plays the youngest player in the 96-player field, 17-year-old countryman Augur-Aliassime, who is looking to secure his first main draw match win. The winner will play No. 32 seed and 2016 runner-up Milos Raonic in the second round.

De Minaur, 18, who started the year with a semi-final run at the Brisbane International presented by Suncorp (l. to Harrison) and reached his first ATP World Tour final the following week at the Sydney International (l. to Medvedev), takes on German Jan-Lennard Struff on Stadium 4.

There are a number of stellar first-round doubles matches. Second seeds Henri Kontinen and John Peers, who reached last year’s quarter-finals open their campaigns, while Del Potro and Dimitrov, John Isner and Jack Sock, and Thiem and Philipp Petzschner compete on the outside courts.