| 18 April 2010
Lookout Roger - there's someone out there who seems pretty intent on taking back that French Open title.
Rafael Nadal showed everyone that he is healthy and hungry to once again dominate the ATP Tour on clay as he utterly destroyed a helpless Fernando Verdasco 6-0, 6-1 in the finals of the Monte Carlo Masters 1000 event on Sunday. It is amazingly his sixth consecutive victory at the event and pulls Rafa even with Roger Federer with a career total of sixteen Masters 1000-level titles and only one short of the all-time record held by Andre Agassi.
“Last year I didn’t play well but won; this year the level is completely different,” Nadal said. “I have been playing well since the start of the season.”
“If he plays like this, no one can beat him,” Verdasco said. “He beat everyone in six years here and I’m just one of them.”
The smile on his face after defeating Verdasco showed just how much this win means to Nadal. It is his first title in almost a year and since that time he has been defeated by just about everyone in the current top ten (Federer, Djokovic (3x), Del Potro (2x), Davydenko (2x), Soderling, Roddick, Cilic and Murray. Forget the injuries to his knees for a second - Nadal was most certainly battling some mental issues as well after nearly twelve months without sinking his teeth into a trophy.
After spending much of 2009 battling those mental and physical issues, Rafa seems to be back on track in 2010. He has reached the finals in Doha, the quarter-finals of the Australian Open, and recently the semis of both hard-court Masters events in Indian Wells and Miami. Now back on his favorite surface, Nadal is once again blowing away the opposition with ease. He did not drop a set all week in Monte Carlo, nor did he even really get tested at any point during the tournament. He dispatched strong clay-court opponents like David Ferrer, Juan Carlos Ferrero and then Verdasco with complete ease.
With about a month to go before Roland Garros, Rafa has plenty of time to find his once invincible confidence on clay. When healthy the 23 year-old Nadal is virtually unstoppable during this portion of the season. Simply put, Rafa rules. It is a statement we seem to have forgotten recently but one that I expect will be once again embedded in our minds by the end of the next Grand Slam.
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