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The King returns to his kingdom: Nadal is back on clay

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Barry Millns explains just why Rafael Nadal is so happy on the dirt and talks us through possible pretenders to his throne as the French Open approaches

Rafael Nadal may not have won a title since last July but with the European clay court season now underway he is again the man to beat. His 18 titles on the surface have included hat-tricks in the last three seasons at Monte Carlo, Barcelona, Rome and Roland Garros, and while defending all those titles again seems a daunting task, you would not put it past him.

Yet this season with the usual two-week gap between Monte Carlo and Rome cut in half, the 21 year-old Spaniard will have to play for four weeks in a row if he is also to compete in Hamburg, where his record 81-match winning streak on clay came to an end last year in the final against Roger Federer. Nadal is not happy about it.

"It's an outrageous way to treat European and clay-court players," Nadal declared. "Moving Miami and Indian Wells back because of college basketball is something I understand because it's very important to them but this is a world tour.

"We only have three Masters Series events and we have to play them with an important tournament like Barcelona all running together. I'm tired of complaining about this but the people in charge of this don't share my opinion and I have to respect that."

Since winning his first title on clay at Sopot in 2004, only three other men aside from Federer have beaten Nadal on the surface - Olivier Mutis (retired), Gaston Gaudio (a spent force now ranked No.252) and world No.26 Igor Andreev. So what is it about Nadal's game which makes him such a formidable opponent on clay?

Firstly, he grew up on the surface so he knows how to move on it. He has the strength to keep going on it hour after hour and he is also very quick to the ball, applying great control when he reaches it.

His counterpunching style means he is an excellent defender, able to return ball after ball like a machine, applying heavy topspin to keep his opponents under pressure, as well as giving himself more time to recover between shots. But he can also turn defence into attack in a flash off both sides, which in part has something to do with his extra strength of being a natural right-hander playing left-handed, and his serve although by no means the quickest, is very effective.

Add all that to his ferociously competitive nature on court, always giving everything to the next point and Nadal is a formidable force, whose exploits have now built up a great aura every time he steps onto court. Therefore, it comes as no surprise that he is currently trading at [1.94] to win his fourth successive French Open, where he has a perfect 21-0 record.

So who can challenge him? Federer [7.6], although the last man to beat Nadal on clay and runner-up to him for the past two years at Roland Garros, clearly has some questions to answer about his own form, which has also left him without a title so far this year.

Interestingly, the world No.1 has linked up with Jose Higueras this week in Estoril with a view to improving his own game. Bearing in mind Higueras' past success with the likes of former French Open champions Michael Chang and Jim Courier and that might prove to be a smart move but on first evidence it may take a while to have any great effect.

To my mind it needs a player with greater aggression off the return than Federer and a fearless approach to take the initiative quickly against Nadal rather than be sucked into a succession of gruelling long rallies. The obvious candidate is Australian Open and Indian Wells champion Novak Djokovic who trades at [9.0] and who reached last year's semi-finals at Roland Garros.

The other man to do that was Nikolay Davydenko who is [24.0] and if the Russian can continue to apply the kind of aggressive, accurate game he used to dismiss Nadal in the final in Miami, then the young Spaniard could find himself under further threat. But such is Nadal's self-belief on the surface that it's is going to take something outstanding to dethrone the King of Clay.