The 2014 ATP/WTA circuit begins with the next stop in Paris on the 2nd Grand Slam of the year the might clay tournament – Roland Garros.

This is the 47th Grand Slam tournament of the Open Era (since 1968) and 81st Roland Garros tournament since 1925. Of course we will see top players, for example Rafael Nadal – the 8 time champion at French Open who is seeded as the top player at the tournament. He will be looking to win his 9th Roland Garros with the record of 59 matches won and 1 lost. His only loss at RG came to Robin Soderling in 2009 in the 4th round of the tournament. Nadal holds the throne as the most prestigeous player at French Open. Bjorn Bong happens to be the 2nd most prestigious with 6 total wins at Roland Garros.

Most recently you may have seen Nadal struggling in the first sets of the Masters tournaments which are up to 3 sets. Nadal is like a steam train, it takes a while for him to kick off but when he does it’s near impossible to stop  the train. Nadal has a… sparkling record of 83 wins and 1 loss on clay in up to 5 set matches. The quiet funny fact is that he’s only been extended to 5 set matches only 4 times in his career – most recently last year against Djokovic in Semi Finals of French Open.

Speaking of the Serb – the world number 2. He now has a great chance to become the world number 1, funnily this tournament will most likely cause some big movements in the rankings. It certainly won’t be an easy job for the most recent champion of ATP Rome, his record certainly isn’t as astonishing as the Spaniards – sitting at 36 wins and 9 losses this is going to be his 10th Roland Garros tournament. Funnily enough 5 of his 9 losses at Roland Garros came to Nadal. Not to forget the last semi-final with the dramatic 5th set that finished 9-7 over the span of 4 hours and 37 mins. If you were to talk about value for money in terms of seeing a Grand Slam tennis semi-final for over €250 per person – this match certainly would be at the top of that list.

Stan the man aka Stanislas Wawrinka “Just call me Stan”

Most recently his victory at the Australian Open over Nadal has given him an invitation to the current top 6 of players with each having a victory in a Grand Slam event. “Just call me Stan” is 6-0 against top 10 players this year, most recently beating Federer in Monte Carlo and clearly showing people who the real Swiss Number 1 is. Wawrinka also has a chance to make history by winning both Australian Open and Roland Garros in the same year since 1992 when Jim Courier had the pleasure to hold trophies for both of the tournaments.

Most recently Stan said he absolutely loves playing on clay at Roland Garros, the most recent weather forecast showing a lot of rain across the next 13 days will give him an advantage by slowing the courts down and allowing him to play shorter points rather than battling in long rallies. Most certainly don’t rule Stan out even when he’s down 2 sets, he has the capability to turn matches around. Only last year he made a massive comeback against Richard Gasquet, being down 2 sets in the match he managed to win 3-2 in the end.

Other shenanigans to look out for

I’ve only been talking about the top 3 players until now. However there’s certainly a lot more to look out for. If you were watching the Madrid Open, you may have discovered a not so tall Asian man named Kei Nishikori. Well he happens to be a true discovery of the year, breaking the top 10 ranking as the first Japanese tennis player ever. Under the wings of Michael Chang he’s been truly magnificent and if he wasn’t so vulnerable because of injuries, he would’ve stolen the trophy from Nadal in Madrid. He’s been recovering very fast and most recently told ESPN that he’s a lot better after the injury but not 100%. It will certainly to be hard to bet in favour of him, or against as it’s tough to say what may happen. However it’d be great to see him back and watch closely in the 1st round.

Father Fed is also coming back to France to give it his best shot. However most recently his coach stated that Roland Garros isn’t their most important objective of the year with Federer playing much better and more aggressive tennis at US Open or Wimbledon. I certainly wouldn’t count him out but it is true that younger players tend to do much better on clay. I would certainly look out for the likes of Dimitrov, Janowicz, Raonic, Thiem and Nishikori to possibly cause some upsets at the tournament. Look closely at Raonic as well, he recently added another coach to his squad. Even Djokovic recently stated that he hasn’t seen Raonic this good ever, and that he got truly lucky in the match which led to 2 tie breaks.

Overall look out for the younger guys to perform above their expectations, Nadal may look like the favourite @ 2.0 outright odds but don’t count him as the winner yet. The win certainly won’t be handed to him, players are getting better, young starts are coming through and the sport is growing on daily basis.

You can find picks in zcode forum on tennis section here