Rafael Nadal made it five French Open titles and avenged last year’s defeat by Robin Soderling as blew away the Swede in straight sets.

Nadal reached the final without dropping a set and the final was no different with the Spaniard coming out on top 6-4 6-2 6-4 in two hours 18 minutes.

The victory ensures that the 24-year-old Spaniard will regain the world number one ranking on Monday and leave Roger Federer one week short of Pete Sampras’s record of 286 weeks at the top.

Soderling, now joins Andy Murray as a two time grand slam final loser – Like Murray once again Soderling’s performance in the final was well short of his best.

Nadal had lost his last two matches against Soderling, but the Swede was up against a Nadal in top form.

Nadal is now just one French Open title behind Bjorn Borg’s record of 6 crowns and like Borg in it is Nadal’s second Roland Garros win without losing a set.

After Robin Soderling eliminated the World No. 1 and defending champion Roger Federer in the quarter finals, this was the final that most people had hoped for and in some ways the Robin Soderling versus Rafael Nadal final  is an even better prospect than the Federer v Nadal match that most folk had been hoping for.

Rafael Nadal has only lost to one person at Roland Garros, namely Robin Soderling  – Nadal has beaten Federer 4 times at the French open and if Federer had made it to the final -  Nadal would have been over whelming odds on favorite to make it 5 in a row.

With Soderling eliminating Federer this could well be the start of the a new French Open rivalry – Soderling has proved that last years run was no fluke and with the knowledge he can beat Nadal at Roland Garros he will go into the match with more belief of winning than say Roger Federer would have had.

This is not exactly reflected in how the bookmakers have it, but that’s likely largely down to the fact that this is a grand slam, Soderling’s performance in last years final was short of his form of the rest of the week. If recent history tells us anything it’s that the most experienced player generally wins the grand slam final. With only Juan Martin Del Potro bucking the trend at last years US Open final.

Rafael Nadal is back where he belongs, after losing in the 4th round of last years French Open, Rafael Nadal has now earned the chance to avenge that defeat by Robin Soderling in the final of 2010 French Open.

Nadal beat the Austrian 22nd seed Jurgen Melzer with a comfortable 6-2 6-3 7-6 (8-6) win in just over two hours.

Nadal’s clay court record now for 2010 is played 21, won 21. After his semi final win the Spaniard spoke to the international press

I think I played my best match today here in Roland Garros, 2010. First two sets I played really well and with my serve I played well all the time, with the forehand too. And with the backhand I am playing better and better every day, but I can improve a little bit more.

Nadal had so far not even dropped a set this year in Paris and with surprise semi-finalist Melzer, he wasnt expected to be troubled today. Meltzer was appearing in his first Grand Slam semi-final and had won just 8 games in two previous meetings with Nadal.

Despite Melzer attacking from the start,  the heavy topspin from Nadal broke the Austrian down and the Spaniard made his first breakthrough in game six when a steady pressure brought about three break points and Melzer lost the game with a double-fault. The result was rarely in doubt after that, Nadal went onto secure the second set and although Melzer kept the second set interesting it was in vain and with searing afternoon heat intensifying Nadal secured the second set.

The third set was a much closer affair with Melzer breaking back with  Nadal serving for the match, Melzer’s had comeback from two sets down against Novak Djokovic in the quarter-final and the  crowd on Chatrier came to life as they sensed an amazing comeback could be on. The Austrian forced the tie break and Nadal found himself drawn into a real contest when he double-faulted at 3-3 but found inspiration when he needed it, sending up a magnificent backhand lob to level at 4-4.

Melzer would not go away though and saved 2 match points, but at 6-6 Nadal made a powerful forehand winner and Nadal secured the set on his third match point.

Should Nadal win on Sunday he will become second on the list of French Open winner with five and only be one behind Bjorn Borg’s six titles. The other carrot dangling in front of Nadal is the world number 1 spot, the Spaniard will retake the no.1 spot with victory tomorrow and with no major points to defend in the next 6 months he will likely remain there until at least the end on 2010 – This is highly significant as Federer will be one week short of matching Pete Sampras’s record of 286 weeks at the top, with Nadal on top again, will Federer ever be world number 1 again.

Though in his way is Robin Soderling – the man who inflicted upon him a first and only Roland Garros defeat in the fourth round last year.

Robin Soderling has once again knocked out the world number 1 at the French Open and makes history in being the first player in 24 grand slams to beat Roger Federer before the semi finals.

The 25-year-old Swede overcame a 12 match losing record and defeat in last year’s final with a convincing 3-6 6-3 7-5 6-4 over the 16 time grand slam champion.

Federer’s amazing record of reaching at least the semi finals of the last 23 grand slams dates back to the 2004 French Open where he lost in the third round to Gustavo Kuerten – Federer in that period, won 14 grand slam titles, reached a further 6 finals (lost 5 to Nadal, 1 to Del Potro) and was only 3 times eliminated in the semi finals (lost to Marat Safin, Rafael Nadal and Novak Djokovic).

The enormity of this knockout is compounded with stat, that since losing to Djokovic at 2008 at the Australian Open the Swiss ace has reached every grand slam final and before that the last final without Federer was the 2005 French Open. For 5 straight years, Federer in the final was almost set in stone.

It all means that the dream French Open final of Nadal and Federer must wait – these two last met in grand slam final over a year ago at the Austrian Open and most fans were hoping to once again see these two living legends cross rackets.

Amazingly after a very torrid 12 months for Nadal which seen him lose his first ever French Open match, miss Wimbledon and a number of other events due to injury, the Spaniard will have the opportunity to regain his number 1 ranking, should he win the evnt this coming Sunday

With just less than a week gone of the 2010 French Open, Rafael Nadal has remained as the overwhelming odds on favorite to lift the title at this years second grand slam.

Rafael Nadal’s return to clay court dominance has seen him unbeaten on the red stuff in the whole of 2010 and better still the world  number 2 has only dropped 2 sets on clay all season. After beating Roger Federer two weeks ago in Madrid, the Spaniards odds lowered whilst Federer’s increased. Unlike Rafa, Federer has struggled on the clay so far this year, though he did improve enough to reach the final in Madrid and has look good so far in his first 3 matches at Rolland Garros.

Andy Murray continues to struggle on clay and is a long shot at 23/1 (Average bookmaker odds), though that does make him 4th favorite – You can though get 35/1 from Betfair if you were thinking of a bet on the Scot.

The only other serious contenders for the title are Novak Djokovic, last years champion Robin Soderling and David Ferrer. Djokovic though has been struggling once again with breathing difficulties, which have plagued him recent years and now hampered his build up to the 2010 French open, though has looked good in his three matches so far. David Ferrer has been the other in-form clay court player in 2010, clocking up 16 wins on clay previosu to the French Open (the highest for any player in 2010). Soderling has sailed through his first 3 matches so far and his moment will likley come in the quarter finals against Federer should both players win their next match.

Betfair as usual have significantly better odds than the average bookmakers.

After the problems of rain delays and the drama of playing in almost darkness, the thrid round draw for the 2010 French Open at Roland Garros has finally been decided.

All 8 of the top seeds have successfully progressed to the 3rd round stage, with the the top of the draw schedued to play their matches on Friday and the Bottom half will play on Saturday.

In the first half of the draw, top seed and defending champion Roger Federer will take on German qualifier Julian Reister, whilst last years finalist 5th seed Robin Soderling faces 29th Seed  Albert Montanes – Federer and Soderling are on course to meet in the quarter finals should they win there next two matches, which will be a repeat of last years final.

Andy Murray will face Marcos Baghdatis in the third round, the Scot has never beaten Baghdatis with the Cypriot having two wins over Murray. The last remaining French player in the mens draw 8th seed Jo-Wilfried Tsonga will meet Holland’s Thiemo De Bakker.

In the bottom half of the draw 3rd seed Novak Djokovic will playVictor Hanescu, 6th seed Andy Roddick will face Teimuraz Gabashvili, 7th seed Fernando Verdasco will face Philipp Kohlschreiber and in the marque match of the third round favourite to win and 2nd seed Rafael Nadal will face former world no.1 Lleyton Hewitt – Though no one seriously gives Hewitt much chance of winning.

If your thinking of betting on any of these matches try Betfair, where you’ll recieve a free £25 for new customers and Betfair constantly offers you the best odds. If you are fancying a flutter on the winner, check out the our French Open Winner Odds.

The 2010 French Open draw is out with hot favorite Rafael drawing a qualifier, defending champ Roger Federer drawing Peter Luczak and Andy Murray will take on Richard Gasquet.

On paper it should be a tough match for Murray and most reports out there claim it to be a tough draw for Murray – But Gasquet hates playing at Roland Garros, he cannot handle the pressure of the home crowd, he is not the player he was three years when he beat Murray twice as he still continues to recover from injury and the overturned drugs ban and finally not many players recover from losing after leading 2 sets to 0 as Gasquet did in their last meeting at Wimbledon 08. So Murray should come through in straight sets.

If he is to win then he’ll likely need to beat Federer in the semi’s and Nadal in the final – so if he achieves that then he deserves the win – highly unlikely though with the devastating clay court form that Nadal has shown recently. The spaniard is unbeaten on clay this year and racked up another 3 masters titles.

Nadal is odds on favorite to win the title at Roland Garros this year – See a full list of the 2010 French Open Odds.