After an incredible surprise win at the Rolex Monte-Carlo Masters by Fabio Fognini, the ATP Tour marches along to the storied Barcelona Open. While not a Masters 1000 event, Barcelona has a long history on the tour and offers a very solid pool of prize money for the winner to collect. Since 2005, Rafael Nadal has had a stranglehold on the Barcelona Open, winning 11 of the previous 14 installments. With only Kei Nishikori (2014/2015) and Fernando Verdasco (2010) having won outside of Nadal, the Spaniard is once again the heavy favorite to win the tournament. Behind an astounding 59-3 career record at Barcelona, the path to the championship – much like at Monte-Carlo – runs through Nadal. Barcelona Open Prize Money 2019 (Payout courtesy of Barcelona Open and converted from Euros to USD) Singles Winner – $560,582 Finalist – $281,954 Semi-finalist – $142,649 Quarter-finalist – $74,667 Round of 16 – $37,423 Round of 32 – $19,708 Round of 48 – $11,055 Doubles (per team) Winner – $188,675 Finalist – $92,365 Semi-finalist – $46,316 Quarter-finalist – $23,771 Round of 16 – $12,281 Rafael Nadal Headlines Star-Studded Barcelona Open Draw Nadal: 'I Found A Way To Win' In Barcelona 2019Rafael Nadal discusses his opening-round win against Leonardo Mayer on Wednesday at the Barcelona Open Banc Sabadell. Watch live tennis streams at tennistv.com. SUBSCRIBE: bit.ly/2dj6EhW WEBSITE: atptour.com/ FACEBOOK: facebook.com/ATPTour/ TWITTER: twitter.com/ATP_Tour INSTAGRAM: instagram.com/atptour/RADIO: bit.ly/2Dictrm PODCAST: bit.ly/2NilRRn About the Official ATP Tour YouTube Channel: Here you will find the latest videos from the ATP Tour, including… 2019-04-24T17:21:44.000Z Despite number three ranked player in the world Alexander Zverev falling in his opening match, the Barcelona Open has held the bulk of its star power heading into the round of 16. Led by defending champion Rafael Nadal looking for his second career four-peat at Barcelona, the field includes a number of other top-ranked players like Nishikori, Theim, Tsitsipas, Auger-Aliassime, and Medvedev. With so many big names all still in the mix, we should be in for an exciting finish at the 2019 Barcelona Open. Along with Nadal going for yet another four-peat at Barcelona, another storyline is former two-time champion Kei Nishikori looking to get back on the board. After Nishikori won in 2014 and 2015, Nadal answered with a string of three consecutive titles to quiet any doubts that he was slipping off his game. A win for Nishikori, especially against Nadal, would go a long ways towards building some confidence heading into a loaded month of May featuring two Masters 1000 events along with the French Open. Felix Auger-Aliassime is another interesting player to watch as while he doesn’t boast the star power (yet) of some of his other competitors, the 18-year-old prodigy might quickly become a household name. Especially deadly on Clay, where his athleticism lets him get to nearly every ball on the court, Auger-Aliassime has already shown off major improvements in his hardcourt game this season. Typically better suited for clay, a big finish at Barcelona could set the young star up nicely for a fantastic clay court season crescendoing with a run at Roland Garros.<doc-sep>While Medvedev is on this journey of improvement, maybe we should learn to be less shocked whenever he shows signs of emotion on the court. He is continuously evolving after all, and isn’t evolution the one thing that separates humans from machines? It always comes as a bit of a shock when Daniil Medvedev smashes his racquet, or screams in joy or frustration, or in general exhibits any trait that is characteristic of a human being. His tennis can be so consistent, so robotic, that you are often lulled into believing he’s actually a machine in the shape of a man. How can a machine feel joy at winning a match, or frustrating at missing a shot? It’s as spooky as it is fascinating. What’s also fascinating is Medvedev’s evolution on the one surface that never seemed suited to his game: clay. Before this year, the Russian had won a grand total of two matches on clay in his entire career, and that seemed perfectly appropriate. His flat-hitting style, coupled with his inability to hit past his opponents, suggested that he’d always need a quick surface to make anything out of his unorthodox groundstrokes. But 2019 has been an eye-opener. Medvedev is not just surviving on clay, he is turning into a lethal force on it. He reached the Monte Carlo semi-final last week, defeating World No. 1 Novak Djokovic along the way. And this week he is into the Barcelona final, having got past accomplished claycourter Kei Nishikori in the semis. Medvedev’s one-dimensional, seemingly rudimentary game shouldn’t work on clay, but for some weird reason it does. Is it perhaps not as rudimentary as it looks? Or has it just been a case of facing relatively low-quality opposition? A look at Medvedev’s list of victims the past couple of weeks should quickly douse that second line of thinking. Apart from Djokovic and Nishikori, he has also defeated Joao Sousa, Albert Ramos-Vinolas, Stefanos Tsitsipas and Nicolas Jarry, all of whom know a thing or two about claycourt tennis. Medvedev has just been better than most of the field, and this run is no fluke. So how is he doing it then? It’s a combination of a number of factors, each as subtle as the next. For one thing, Medvedev has sneaky good movement on clay. He gets to more balls than any 6’6” player rightly should, which automatically makes him better-placed to extend the rallies and tire out his opponents. It is the ultimate paradox of height in tennis – longer limbs move slower than shorter ones, but they also cover a greater surface area in the same number of strides. And Medvedev’s long legs are eating up vast amounts of clay right now, making him an extraordinarily pesky opponent to get the ball past. The Russian’s height also helps him with his serve. Sure, it never looks like he is serving from a tree. For the most part his serve is easy to read, as he just rolls it in or adopts a laughably wide position (in the deuce court). But he can also crank up the pace on his first delivery when he really needs to; on some of the big points against Nishikori on Saturday, his serve speed was close to 140 mph. Moreover, the acute angles he can generate when serving from that height will always pose problems no matter what the surface. A shot that pulls your opponent out of the court is a shot that gives you an advantage in any point, anywhere in the world. Another aspect of Medvedev’s game that is easy to escape appreciation is how he hits so many shots to the same spot despite using very little topspin. The most obvious objective of hitting with topspin is to maintain consistency; the revolutions imparted on the ball allow you to hit hard and deep and still land it in the court. But Medvedev hits consistently deep without the aid of exaggerated spin, which suggests that his hand skills are a notch higher than the rank-and-file players. Watch any match of Medvedev’s closely, and you’ll see how he caresses and maneuvers the ball to do his bidding even when he is on the dead run. His passing shots are accurate and expertly angled, and his defense off the backhand side is remarkable despite never threatening to be spectacular. On clay Medvedev has another height-related advantage: he is almost never out of position. His tall frame makes it difficult to push him too far back with high-bouncing balls; a topspin-heavy shot usually ends up being right in his hitting zone. If anything, clay actually helps him with his striking stance as it doesn’t require him to bend low as often as he has to on other surfaces – thus nullifying the most commonly exploited tactic against tall players. All things considered, maybe Medvedev’s success on clay shouldn’t have come as such a surprise. He is, in effect, adding his own touches to the template set by his fellow 6’6” youngsters – Alexander Zverev and Karen Khachanov – and showing that tall players can be dangerous not just with their power, but also with their movement. Fleet-footed giants may well be on their way to establishing a stranglehold over the sport, because there is no aspect of the game that they haven’t got covered. But we also have to ask ourselves the next obvious question: when Medvedev has so many inherent plusses in his game, why did he falter so often on clay before 2019? The answer to this is a lot simpler: the backhand. We’ve always known Medvedev has a solid backhand, but we’ve never known him to take charge of points with it the way he’s been doing the last couple of weeks. He is now hitting his backhand down the line more often and with great disguise too, regularly wrong-footing his opponents into errors. On occasion he’s even been running around his forehand to hit a backhand, thus masking perhaps the biggest weakness in his game: the lack of point-ending power on his forehand.<doc-sep>A lot of money is at stake in this week's Barcelona Open. Rafael Nadal will seek his 12th title in the Spanish event, he features as a defending champion having defeated Stefanos Tsitsipas in the last year's final. Alexander Zverev took a last minute wild card and he will try to earn some match rhythm after a disappointing season so far for him. The German lost to Fabio Fognini in Monte Carlo. In Barcelona, the men's singles winner will earn €503,000, while €253,000 are for the finalist. The semifinalist will earn €128,000. Just playing the main draw first round guarantees you more than €9,000. Fabio Fognini, who will play in Barcelona as well, was surprised with his Monte Carlo Masters run, where he ended up winning the title against Dusan Lajovic: "I have to say something at the beginning of the tournament, I would say that I was really lucky. But, you know, after Gilles retired and, you know, I have another opportunity to play a great match with Sascha, and now I have won. Of course, if you tell me at the beginning of the week, I will see you on Sunday, I would laugh in your face. I was 6-4, 4-1 down and breakpoint for 5-1, and I make an ace on the line (smiling). But that's an incredible sport. So I was lucky."<doc-sep>A packed Wednesday is about to happen in Barcelona. Félix Auger-Aliassime will open the schedule against Malek Jaziri, followed by David Ferrer and Lucas Pouille. The Frenchman leads head to head meetings 2-0 having won in 2016 Miami and Rome. After that Rafael Nadal opens his campaign against Leonardo Mayer. The Spaniard will seek his sixth win over six matches played. The Argentinean only won a set against Nadal in the 2017 US Open, they last faced each other in last year's Australian Open. The match between Grigor Dimitrov and Fernando Verdasco is expected to be a very balanced one. They are tied on 3-all and the Bulgarian won their most recent match in 2018 Canada. They first faced each other in 2013 Bastad with Verdasco prevailing in three. Denis Shapovalov will play against Christian Garin, the Canadian won the 2016 Davis Cup tie match. Daniil Medvedev will play against Albert Ramos, Nikola Kuhn faces Roberto Carballes. Before the Barcelona Open, coming from his loss to Fabio Fognini in the Monte Carlo Masters semifinals, Nadal said: "My personal opinion is that I played one of the worst matches on clay. It's a reality. There is no need to hide it. I do not see the benefit of wanting to deny it. What has happened has happened. In Monte-Carlo, I took a step forward with how I was a week before. I lost a good opportunity to start the season in a fantastic way. But now I'm going to have another one. This is a very special tournament that is part of the history of tennis and of my own. I have another morning to practice, and we will see how we are doing. On a physical level, I'm more or less well”.<doc-sep>
World No. 2 Rafael Nadal is seeing redemption at the Barcelona Open, a tournament that includes a tennis court named after the clay legend, the Pisa Rafa Nadal, at the Real Club de Tenis Barcelona-1899. The top seed here, Nadal is seeking his 12th title to add to his ‘Undecima’ haul, at the oldest Spanish tennis club. But the ‘king of clay’ is entering the Spanish tournament at a slight disadvantage. Although he got to the semis at Monte Carlo—another ATP event where he owns 11 crowns—he lost to the tournament winner, Fabio Fognini. But it was no ordinary loss, with concern from fans over the ease with which the Italian beat him—on clay! —almost bageling him the last set. Rafa was very forthright that the easy loss troubled him as well. “My personal opinion is that I played one of the worst matches on clay. It's a reality. There is no need to hide it. I do not see the benefit of wanting to deny it,” Nadal spoke with the ATP on Monday after his mini-tennis match with Kei Nishikori, at the Palau de la Música Catalana. “What has happened has happened”. Despite the lack of titles in the last nine months, the 17-time grand slam champion has clocked in a highly consistent season. He made the finals in Australia—ultimately losing to Novak Djokovic at the end of his winning streak—and his grand slam performance has been superior to Roger Federer’s in the last 12 months, although the Swiss has been able to capitalize on two ATP titles this year. Novak Djokovic and Federer are first and second in the ATP Race to London standings, but Rafa sits in third. “It is true that I have not won any titles, but I reached the final in Australia, semi-finals in Indian Wells and now semi-finals again in Monte-Carlo. The year is not bad and I'm third in the [ATP Race To London], but with more problems than I would have liked,” Nadal said. His right knee injury forced him to retire a highly anticipated matchup with Federer in Miami, where the 20-time slam winner went on to collect the title. The Spaniard looked fully recovered once clay season started, the time of year when the legend shines. But the 11-time French Open winner seemed to indicate that the injury was still a concern, with Rafa looking to build back confidence tournament-by-tournament. “In Monte-Carlo, I took a step forward with how I was a week before. I lost a good opportunity to start the season in a fantastic way. But now I'm going to have another one. “The job is to find myself. During the last 18 months, I have had too many stops and ups and downs, non-tennis related. And when that happens, it's hard to pick up rhythm and continuity. But it is true that it has happened so many times, and that after things go well... everything that happened seems to be forgotten. I hope to be ready to play well. And if it is not here, it will be in Madrid, in Rome or at Roland Garros”. No one seems to bounce back from injury like the oft-wounded 32-year-old. Up next for him will be Argentinian Leonard Mayer, who the Nadal has beaten in all of their five meetings. “This is a very special tournament that is part of the history of tennis and of my own. I have another morning to practice, and we will see how we are doing. On a physical level, I'm more or less well,” continued Rafa. Rafael Nadal and Leonard Mayer face each other on Wednesday.