The draw is made and Rafael Nadal dodged the first bullet as he has a pretty easy first couple of rounds. He plays Daniel Marcos of Brazil in the 1st round and Daniel Gimeno-Traver from Spain or a qualifier in the 2nd. Obviously Nadal is going to feel the pressure because he is trying to do something that hasn’t been done since 1969, which is not having more # 1’s than the Beatles…but win 4 majors in a row. The last man to do this was Rod Laver and wouldn’t it be fitting to do it right here in Melbourne on the Rod Laver Arena with the Australian handing Rafa the trophee. On the womens side Steffi Graf actually won all four, the Grand Slam, in 1988 and took away my only chance of being on the cover of Sports Illustrated, the most important sports magazine in the world and I have not forgiven her for that! In fact Steffi won the Gold medal at the Olympics that year as well.

In the 3rd round Nadal is supposed to play the 31st seed Feliciano Lopez but young australian Bernard Tomic is ready to take a step towards the very best so potentially a tricky round to get through.

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