Tennis: French Open-Adam impressed by Nadal’s performance |21 June 2006

Adam has met some of the greatest tennis players through his many stop-overs at the grand slam events in recent years and the highlight of his recent trip to Paris was his meeting with Belgian superstar Kim Clijsters. Belgian Clijsters lost in the semifinal to her compatriot Justine Henin-Hardene who went on to win the women’s singles event, beating Russian Svetlana Kuznetsova in straight sets.

Adam also met Russia’s Elena Dementieva who lost in the third round and promising young French male player Gaël Montfils who beat some good players like Andy Murray of Britain, Dick Norman of Belgium and James Blake of USA before losing to Jovak Jokovic of Serbia and Montenegro in the eighth final.

Adam was most impressed with the performance of men’s singles winner Rafael Nadal of Spain. Nadal won his second successive Roland Garros title with a 3-1 (1-6 6-1 6-4 7-6) victory over world number one player Roger Federer of Switzerland.

Although Adam did not meet Nadal, he was nonetheless impressed by the player’s performance, especially in his wins over Leyton Hewitt and Paul Henri Mathieu.

Speaking to Sports Nation, Adam said that “Nadal is the king of clay”.
Nadal’s win over Federer was his 60th straight on clay which is a record.