Barcelona men's preview.

There is only one tournament this week.  The men are playing in Barcelona, and the WTA features no tournaments, but the Fed Cup semifinals are over the weekend.

The Barcelona Open Banc Sabadell is a clay court tournament in Barcelona, Spain.  The winner will go home with a prize of 286,000 (probably Euros).

Top 8 Seeds:

1. Rafael Nadal (#3 world ranking)

2. Robin Soderling (#8)

3. Jo-Wilfried Tsonga (#10)

4. Fernando Gonzalez (#11)

5. Fernando Verdasco (#12)

6. Tomas Berdych (#15)

7. Juan Carlos Ferrero (#16)

8. David Ferrer (#17)

Other notables in this weeks field:  Tommy Robredo, Juan Monaco, Jurgen Melzer, Lleyton Hewitt, Thomaz Bellucci, Albert Montanes, Nicolas Almagro, Feliciano Lopez, David Nalbandian, Ernests Gulbis, Richard Gasquet, Igor Andreev, and Victor Hanescu.

This tournament is Nadal's to lose.  He is heads and shoulders better than any of these guys on the dirt.  Its just a shame that David Ferrer is in the same quarter as Nadal, but on the opposite side Nadal will be facing one of these three guys in the final: Juan Carlos Ferrero, Jo-Wilfried Tsonga, and Robin Soderling...I'm just not sure which yet, although I am leaning towards Juan Carlos Ferrero.

Here is a pretty cool picture of Soderling and Verdasco "tooling" around on top of the hotel in Barcelona.  If I was Verdasco I'd let Soderling win, and not risk having Darth Soderling toss him over the side.

(Fed Cup Preview and predictions later in the week.)