Preview: Internazionali BNL d'Italia
City: Rome, Italy
Surface: Outdoor Clay
Championship Points: 1000
2008 Singles Champion: Novak Djokovic
2008 Doubles Champions: Mike Bryan & Bob Bryan

The top ATP playes will be in contention. Most of the American singles players will be in attendance. Andy Roddick, Gael Monfils, David Nalbandian and Mario Ancic have all withdrawn.

Rafael Nadal is clearly the one to beat. He has already won two of the three Masters tournaments this year and is having another ridiculous year. The only way he loses if he is injured or gets struck by lightening. Though I noticed, his half of the draw is loaded with all the dangerous players (Murray, Verdasco, Davydenko). This is the same tournament where Juan Carlos Ferrero unexpectedly snapped Nadal's winning streak on clay last year, so anything could happen.

Aside from Nadal, it is the usual suspects of Roger Federer, Novak Djokovic, and Andy Murray. Djokovic won the tournament last year and looked good in the Monte-Carlo final against Nadal. I think he is the better bet on clay than Murray.

Andy Murray has improved greatly on clay but comes down with the case of Nadalitis when he plays the Spaniard. It happens on clay as well as other surfaces, despite the conventional wisdom from the Jason Goodalls of the world. Murray is also in Nadal’s half on the draw.

Roger Federer is having a bad year and is in rapid decline, but he is always dangerous. The Swiss did get it together last year to win the US Open when everyone wrote him off like a bad check. It is also beneficial to him that his quarter of the draw is pretty friendly to him. He only has to get past Djokovic in the semifinals.

I will keep hope alive that Gilles Simon will get it together in time (if he no one upsets him) for the quarterfinals to challenge Federer. Simon is currently 2-0 over the Swiss. I would like to see if he really has Federer’s number. As for the other Musketeers, Tsonga has been battling injury over the last couple of weeks, and Gasquet just lacks courage. Tsonga and Gasquet play each other in the first round and are in Nadal’s quarter.

There are also the next-tier players who could break at any time. They include Juan Martin del Potro, Fernando Verdasco and Stanislas Wawrinka. Veterans Fernando Gonzalez and Nikolay Daveydenko could also be trouble if they get hot for the week. There are also the other three Spaniards of David Ferrer, Tommy Robredo and Nicolas Almagro, who are great on clay but are kind of harmless when the top-four are around.

Tournament Draw
Singles / Doubles

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(Images: Internazionali BNL D’Italia/Costantini)

Prior to this match, Rafael Nadal had won all four of his meetings against Juan Martin del Potro without losing a set. The Argentine had done well last year to end the year ranked world number nine. Although he is currently ranked seventh in the world, the knock on Del Potro is that he fades against the top tier players. It was only going to be a matter of time before the 19-year-old made some adjustments and surprised someone.

Del Potro won in Auckland at the beginning of this year. In his next tournament, Roger Federer killed him in the quarterfinals of the Australian Open where he only won three games in the entire match. He lost routinely to Rafael Nadal in straight sets last week at Indian Wells.

On paper, this match looked like it was going to be another routine win for Nadal. Gabriela Sabatini (some of the WTA ladies, please take some notes on how not to be sleazy) was in attendance, and she must have provided some inspiration for the young Argentine.

In the opening set, del Potro went toe-to-toe with Nadal, and the set was even after eight games. The Argentine broke Nadal in the ninth game and held serve to take the first set 6-4.

In the second set, del Potro struck first with a break in third game. It looked like it was going to be lights out for Nadal, but the Spanish giant woke up. Nadal then rallied to win five games in a row and then cruised to take the second set 6-3.

Nadal jumped to a 3-0 lead in the third set. It looked like del Potro was going to fade away. The Argentine struck back by winning four games in a row to bring the set to 4-3. He had the crowd behind him and was back to giving the Mallorcan trouble.

Del Potro started serving bigger and returned to going toe-to-toe in groundstrokes with Nadal, like in the first set. He then began to give Nadal a taste of his own medicine and began to move Nadal around to eventually pull him off the court to set up the winner. Instead of finishing off points at the back of the court, he began to come forward to emphatically cut off points at the net, which proved to be fatal for the Spaniard. Nadal tried to reassert himself in the match and tried to pull del Potro off the court, but the Argentine only came up with bigger shots.

Nadal then held serve to stop the Argentinean run and level the set to 4-4. The level of Nadal’s serve dropped in the twelfth game, and del Potro had two match points in no time. Nadal staved off three match points during this game to hold serve and take the set to a tiebreak.

During the tiebreak, the two players were tied at two when the ball slid over the net to fall on del Potro’s side after a Nadal forehand, which gave the Spaniard a mini-break. It looked like it was going to be lights out for the youngster, but del Potro broke back on both of Nadal’s service points to jump ahead 4-3. The young Argentine never looked back and went on to take the tiebreak, the set and the match 6-4 3-6 7-6(3).

This is del Potro’s first big win over one of the top four, and it will take him to world number five next week. It was great to watch him ratchet up his game for the win against the world number one. Let’s hope he keeps this up and starts giving the top four some much needed trouble this year.

(images: Getty Images)