RAFA NADAL WINS OVER GASQUET IN SHANGHAI OPENER!

Rafa

Rafa

Rafa

Rafa played very well in his first match at the Masters Cup in Shanghai. When the match started there was a very small crowd, but it filled out a lot during the play.

It must be hard to come to the end of the long season and not be very tired and in much need of rest and a lifting of the pressure. Rafa moved well, no sign of pain. Hopefully, his confidence will get an extra boost and he will bring on a gradual increase of those famous Rafa "after shot responses". The fist pumps with such flare. The Rafa Flare.

The results of the Nadal vs. Gasquet: 3-6, 6-3, 6-4

How exciting to see Rafa play so well in the first Round Robin game in Shanghai November 11.
I watched it on ATP starting at 1:00 a.m. EST. The whole series can be watched live for $10 on
http://www.atpmastersseries.tv/page/TournamentInterview/0,,11444,00.html

Rafa the man and Rafa the Clay Statue

Rafa at the Opening Ceremony of the Masters Cup in Shanghai

Rafa Nadal of Mallorca, Spain and Fernando Gonzalez of Chile
at the Opening Ceremony

Richard Gasquet on the way to the Opening Ceremony

Rafa Nadal

Below is an article fromwww.masters-cup.com

Nadal Puts Perfect Record on Line vs. Gasquet

Play in the 2007 Tennis Masters Cup begins Sunday with three of the four singles players in the Gold Group - No. 3 Novak Djokovic of Serbia, No. 6 David Ferrer of Spain and No. 8 Richard Gasquet of France -- making their first career appearances at the prestigious eight-man, year-ending tournament. World No. 2 Rafael Nadal rounds at the Gold Group in the round-robin formatted event.

Gasquet will have the honor of starting off this year's tournament by going up against Nadal in the opening match of the day.

Nadal, who reached the semifinals last year in his first Tennis Masters Cup appearance, holds a perfect 3-0 career record over Gasquet, which is bound to put some added pressure on the Frenchman. The interesting information here is that the two have not faced off against each other in a long time - their last outing was in the 2005 Roland Garros third round.

Both of these players turned 21 this past June and have captured titles this year.

Nadal enhanced his reputation as the King of Clay when he scored his third consecutive Roland Garros title. In all, he reeled in six of his 23 career titles in 2007. Gasquet won the Mumbai title - which saw him the accomplish the rare feat of claiming titles on all four surfaces in his young career - and reached the finals at Tokyo and Estoril.

Nadal is bracing for a tough opener: "Gasquet is one of the most talented players in the world, so for sure it's going to be a very hard first match," he said.

In the other singles match of the day, Djokovic will be taking on another Tennis Masters Cup newcomer in Ferrer.

Djokovic will be trying to cap the best year of his career with a big showing at this final event of the season. He's won five of his seven career titles this season - Vienna, Adelaide, AMS Miami, AMS Canada and Estoril. He also made quite a splash at the grand slams, reaching his first career major final at the US Open as well as securing semifinal berths at Roland Garros and Wimbledon.

As for Ferrer, he won three of his five career trophies this year at Auckland, Bastad and Tokyo. The Spaniard also reached two semifinals and seven quarterfinals.

"It will be a very tough match but at Masters Cup there are no easy matches," Ferrer said. "It's very special to be playing in my first Masters and it is a dream to be here."

These two are neck-and-neck with a 2-2 tied record against each other. Three of their prior matches happened to take place this year - Djokovic won their quarterfinal outing at AMS Indian Wells, Ferrer won their round-of-16 meeting at AMS Monte Carlo, and Djokovic scored his US Open final berth with a victory over Ferrer in the semifinals.


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www.youtube.com/watch?v=KTj0D4tjnlg
Top Eight Photo shoot at the Shanghai 2006 Tennis Masters Cup
Youtube of the Red Group and the Gold group with four great male tennis players in each group
By kasamaharuhiko

1 Federer TMC Record: 22-2 4 Davydenko TMC Record: 4-3 5 Roddick TMC Record: 6-5 7 Gonzalez TMC Record: 1-1

2 Nadal TMC Record: 2-2 3 Djokovic TMC Record: 0-0 6 Ferrer TMC Record: 0-0 8 Gasquet TMC Record: 0-0

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