Mateo Arnaldi, Carlos Alcaraz's rival in Indian Wells

Matteo Arnaldi will be the competitor Carlos Alcaraz In the second round of the Indian Wells Masters 1000. The 23-year-old Italian, ranked 40th in the world, defeated Frenchman Luca van Assche on Wednesday (7-6 (6), 7-6 (3)) and will face the Spaniard on Friday (at a time to be confirmed later).

This will be the second time that Arnaldi, one of the young talents of the burgeoning trans-Alpine tennis player, who is ranked second in the rankings, will be in front of him on the tennis court. They met last year in the round of 16 of the US Open, with Carlitos winning comfortably in three sets (6-3, 6-3 and 6-4).

Arnaldi is not having an easy season at all. Since reaching the quarter-finals in Brisbane at the beginning of last January (he lost to Russian Roman Saviolin), He was unable to win two consecutive matches.

However, since he did not defend as many points compared to last year, he settled into the top 40which allows you to enter the main draws of many tournaments without having to go through the previous tournament.

On Wednesday, Alcaraz trained in Indian Wells for the first time since the exhibition confrontation against Rafael Nadal in Las Vegas, in which he won over the Balearic Islands last Sunday. The Murcian played with American Tommy Paul and was received as an idol by American audiences. Not in vain, he is the current champion.