AFTER the success of the co-currently running Fed Cup Fantasy Tennis tournament, Draft Central has decided to test the waters with an individual tournament that was cancelled this year due to the COVID-19 pandemic. We start with the first ATP Tour that was cancelled in the Masters 1000 event, BNP Paribas Open at Indian Wells.

Last year, Austrian Dominic Thiem took out the title defeating Roger Federer in three sets. To make this event as realistic as possible, we have removed any players who would not have played at Indian Wells in 2020 from thinking. Federer is one of those who had already announced his withdrawal from the Californian event, and along with Japan’s Kei Nishikori, France’s Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and Argentinian Guido Pella, will not be entered in this fantasy draw. We have also made the entrants really simple and picked the 96 remaining players in the top 100 to fill out the draw, with appropriate seeding.

The draw and tournament itself

The way Indian Wells works is it has a Round of 128, but unlike Grand Slams, all the 32 seeds have byes so are automatically through to the Round of 64. It leaves the remaining 64 unseeded players to battle it out, with each winner guaranteed to play a seeded player in the next round. It is a sure-fire way to get as many of the world’s top 30 players into the deep stages of the tournament.

How will it be simulated?

In terms of calculating performance and results, while we like to add our own spin to it, the winner and loser will be determined by adding the coefficient of their ELO ranking to a random simulator. The greater the player and ELO ranking, the more chance they have of winning the match. The reason for picking the ELO over pure rankings or ranking points is to factor in court surface, which in the case of Indian Wells is hard court. Therefore those with a better hard court ranking will perform strongly against those who are not so strong.

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2020 Indian Wells preview: Quarter by Quarter

Q1:

World number one, Novak Djokovic will lead all comers when it comes to favouritism at Indian Wells. Yet to lose in 2020 and coming off an Australian Open title in January, he is unsurprisingly the man to beat. He has a likely Round of 64 clash with Kyle Edmund, while 30th seed Filip Krajinovic could be his opponent in the Round of 32. Fast forward to the Round of 16 and Stan the Man (Stan Wawrinka) provides a potentially tantalising match-up, with Australian James Duckworth also in that group. Of the top quarter, the most entertaining block is the one which sees Next Gen Rising Star, Jannik Sinner taking on consistent Spaniard, Albert Ramos-Vinolas for a crack at 14th seed Karen Khachanov in the second round. Casper Ruud is on track to face young gun, Felix Auger-Alissame in the Round of 32, with Alexander Zverev and Jan-Lennard Struff on course for an all-German Round of 32 meeting with Struff slotting into the 32nd seed.

Q2:

A first round clash between big servers, Reilly Opelka and Marin Cilic to take on Matteo Berrettini in the Round of 64 might be huge, but that’s before big improvers, Soonwoo Kwon and Marton Fucsovics face off for the right to play Alex de Minaur in the next round. That is all in the 1/16th of the bracket. Lucas Pouille looms as the danger man in the next group with his ELO close to that of both seeds, John Isner and Fabio Fognini, while Diego Schwartzman is comfortably ahead of any players near him and would have one eye on a Round of 16 meeting with third seed, Daniil Medvedev. Medvedev will play the winner of Fernando Verdasco and John Millman with less than three points between them and set to be a ripping contest.

Q3:

Reigning champion Thiem comes into the next third with a quarter final potential clash with Stefanos Tsitsipas mouthwatering to say the least. But this quarter is stacked full of in-form or up-and-coming players likely to cause headaches for opponents. Andrey Rublev, Hubert Hurkacz and Grigor Dimitrov all slide into this group, with the unseeded Nick Kyrgios taking on Australian Open quarter finalist, Tennys Sandgren in a huge first round clash. Roberto Bautista Agut awaits the winner there, while Philipp Kohlschreiber and Ugo Humbert are also among the tricky players in the group.

Q4:

The final quarter of the draw has plenty of seeded talent, with Rafael Nadal and Gael Monfils eyeing each other off in the quarter final race. They cannot afford to look too far though, with the likes of David Goffin, Denis Shapovalov, Milos Raonic and in-form Cristian Garin also in the quarter. Yoshihito Nishioka is deceptively strong on hard court despite his low ranking and his first round clash with Swede, Mikael Ymer is set to be a beauty. Jeremy Chardy and Tommy Paul are also in the quarter, along with a host of clay courters who might struggle on the surface.

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Schedule:

Monday, April 13: Round of 128 half
Tuesday, April 14: Round of 128 half
Wednesday, April 15: Round of 64 half
Thursday, April 16: Round of 64 half
Friday, April 17: Round of 32 half
Saturday, April 18: Round of 32 half
Sunday, April 19: Round of 16 half
Monday, April 20: Round of 16 half
Tuesday, April 21: Quarter Finals
Wednesday, April 22: Semi-Finals
Thursday, April 23: Final