Sydney wildcard Christopher O'Connell has marched into the quarter-finals of the Adelaide International but South Australian Alex Bolt's dreams of a home fairytale have been denied emphatically by top seed Tommy Paul.

Meanwhile, giant-slaying Jordan Thompson's hopes of competing in the Australian Open are in doubt after he hobbled through a second-round loss to Italian Lorenzo Musetti.

Thompson, who captured the nation's imagination last week by sensationally saving three match points to stun the great Rafael Nadal in Brisbane, aggravated an upper left leg injury in his 6-4 6-1 defeat to fourth seed Musetti on Wednesday.

After not winning a point on either Musetti's first or second serves in the opening set, Thompson took a medical time-out before becoming further incapacitated in the second set.

Musetti's quarter-final opponent will be eighth seed Alexander Bublik, who mowed down Briton Daniel Evans 4-6 6-2 6-1.

O'Connell hardly broke sweat in trouncing Alexander Shevchenko 6-3, 6-1 on Wednesday to book a date with third seed Sebastian Korda in the final eight at Memorial Drive.

O'Connell, who temporarily retired from the sport to clean boats in 2018 following a spate of injuries, whizzed 12 aces past his Russian opponent and didn't face a break point.

Bolt, a quarter-finalist at Adelaide in 2020 and cheered on by a parochial home crowd, was unable to follow O'Connell's lead, thoroughly outclassed by world number 13 Paul 6-3, 6-2.

"I couldn't have asked for a better match," said Paul, who will play Jack Draper for a berth in the semi-finals.

"I thought I played a really clean match. I'm really excited to get the season started. I'm excited to be back out here."

Draper, who beat Paul in last year's Adelaide International, advanced after surviving a drama-filled 5-7, 7-6 (11/9), 7-6 (9/7) marathon against Serb Miomir Kecmanovic.

He saved two match points in the second set before overcoming a 2-5 deficit in the third-set tiebreak to prevail in three hours, 39 minutes.

Play was halted for several minutes during the deciding set with Kecmanovic refused to play until a supervisor was called out.

He was irate at being denied a medical time-out while also being on the wrong end of a controversial call, with the umpire ruling a ball that got stuck in the net tape in Draper's favour to put the Englishman up 6-5.

Earlier, second seed Nicolas Jarry saved a match point in his tense 6-7 (5/7), 7-6 (9/7), 6-4 victory over Italian Matteo Arnaldi.

Jarry, who also came back from match points down against the same opponent last season in Beijing, fell behind 6-7 in the breaker with two Arnaldi serves to come before the big Chilean rattled off the next three points and maintained that high level in the third.

Korda advanced with a hard-fought 6-4, 7-6 (12/10) win against Italy's Lorenzo Sonego.

AAP