Wed May 7 14:00:32 2008

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Nadal loses to Ferrero on clay in Rome

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Rome, Italy (Sports Network) - For only the second time in his last 105 matches on clay, Rafael Nadal came up a loser Wednesday at the $3.5 million Italian Masters, a French Open tune-up.

Former world No. 1 Juan Carlos Ferrero stunned his second-seeded fellow Spaniard 7-5, 6-1 on the dirt at Foro Italico. Nadal hadn't lost on his beloved clay since giving way to top-ranked superstar Roger Federer in last May's finale at the Hamburg Masters.

Ferrero prevailed in 1 hour, 54 minutes with the help of three service breaks on Day 3 here, compared to zero breaks for the surprising loser Nadal, who was riding an 11-match overall winning streak, including 10 wins on clay.

Nadal was the reigning three-time Rome champion and fresh off his fourth straight Barcelona championship last week. The three-time French Open champ and two-time Wimbledon finalist beat Chilean Fernando Gonzalez in last year's Rome finale and is still an amazing 103-2 in his last 105 matches on the dirt.

The former French Open champion Ferrero, unseeded this week, was the Rome champ back in 2001.

Third-seeded Australian Open champion and U.S. Open runner-up Novak Djokovic avoided an upset by handling Belgian Steve Darcis 6-4, 6-0, but other upsets came when Czech Radek Stepanek ran out fifth-seeded Spaniard David Ferrer 4-6, 6-2, 6-1 and Spanish clay-court specialist Nicolas Almagro erased seventh- seeded Argentine star David Nalbandian 6-4, 7-5. Ferrer was last week's Barcelona runner-up to Nadal. Nalbandian was the 2004 runner-up here in Rome.

Fourth-seeded Russian Nikolay Davydenko moved into the third round by dispatching Croatian wild card Mario Ancic 6-2, 6-2, while eighth-seeded American James Blake held off Italian crowd favorite Andreas Seppi 7-6 (7-5), 3-6, 6-1.

A 12th-seeded Gonzalez stayed hot with a 6-3, 6-2 thrashing of Russian qualifier Evgeny Korolev, while Russian slugger Igor Andreev dismissed 13th- seeded Argentine Juan Monaco 4-6, 6-1, 6-4. "Gonzo" is fresh off his clay- court title in Munich.

Additional second-round wins came for Peruvian qualifier Luis Horna, Italian Simone Bolelli and Spaniard Fernando Verdasco. Bolelli was last week's Munich runner-up to Gonzalez.

This week's winner will take home $558,000.