Tallon Griekspoor reached the quarter-finals of a Masters tournament for the first time in his career with a straight-sets win against Japanese qualifier Yosuke Watanuki.

The 28-year-old won a tense first set at Indian Wells on a tie-break, but managed to break his opponent early in the second set and cruise to a 7-6 6-1 victory, following a brief interruption for rain.

“This really means a lot to me,” said Griekspoor, who beat world number 2 Alexander Zverev in the second round. “It’s never easy to play again after such a great win against Zverev. But it gave me a lot of self-confidence.”

His opponent in the quarter-final on Thursday will be the 21-year-old Danish player Holger Rune, ranked 13th in the world. Griekspoor won both previous matches against Rune, most recently at last year’s Madrid Open.