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Cameron Norrie won the title at Indian Wells in 2021 [Getty Images]
Great Britain's Cameron Norrie beat Australian qualifier Rinky Hijikata in the last 16 at Indian Wells and could meet world number one Carlos Alcaraz in the quarter-finals.
Norrie is yet to drop a set at this year's tournament, backing up his win over sixth seed Alex de Minaur in the previous round with an impressive 6-4 6-2 victory over world number 117 Hijikata in one hour and 16 minutes.
The 30-year-old left-hander broke Hijikata's serve in the opening game of the match and, after wrapping up the first set, broke twice more in the second to race into the last eight.
On his own serve, the 27th seed faced only one break point in the match.
Norrie has a good record at the hard-court event in California.
This is his eighth appearance in the men's singles and it is the fourth time that he has made it to at least the quarter-final stage.
He won the title in 2021, but lost in the last eight in the following two years.
Alcaraz will hope to secure his quarter-final place against Norwegian 13th seed Casper Ruud later on Wednesday.
Norrie has won three of his eight tour-level matches against the Spaniard, including their most recent meeting at the Paris Masters in October.
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Norrie told BBC Sport he has gained confidence from his results at Indian Wells so far - and also from an "unreal" pre-tournament practice session with world number two Jannik Sinner.
"Since I arrived here, I have been practising unreal," he said.
"I had a practice with Jannik Sinner, it was my first practice here. We had the centre court and it was meant to be two hours, but we were both having an unreal practice and both enjoying it.
"He's like, 'No, come on man, let's keep going'. I had something to do for the tournament and he had a photoshoot to do, and he was just like, 'Cancel that'.
"I had to text my agent and postpone my thing and we kept going. I think we played about three hours and 20 minutes.
"That really got me going for the tournament and that set the tone really high."
Meanwhile, British duo Jack Draper and Sonay Kartal are also scheduled to play their last-16 matches later.
Draper, the defending champion at Indian Wells, will face Serbia's 24-time Grand Slam winner Novak Djokovic.
Kartal, who defeated 2025 Australian Open winner Madison Keys in her previous match, will next take on Kazakhstan's Elena Rybakina - who won her second major title in Melbourne in January.
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