The 26-year-old Soderling stopped a sluggish Monfils, who defeated Roger Federer in a three-set semifinal. “I’m in a learning process. Every time I get to a final like this something goes wrong, and this time it was the preparation. I had to rush too much,” Monfils said. “And also, at one stage in the match I tried to change my plan. I should maybe not have done that and keep with simple things…Yesterday I used up a lot of energy, and today I wasn’t able to find the extra stamina that I would have needed to be more competitive.”

CBS commentator Mary Carillo, still not a big fan of the WTA’s on-court coaching where the [almost always] male coach comes on court to save the woman player who can’t problem-solve for herself: “I can’t stand it. It makes us look weak compared to men’s tennis.”…

Roddick and Malisse play in rematch of their 2001 Atlanta title bout.

James Blake lost his fourth straight match last night in Atlanta.

Taylor Dent talks about his family.

“Was it in the third I was down Love-40 in that one game? I’m not sure,” Federer said. “That was the moment I felt was the toughest because if I wouldn’t have come out of that game, I don’t think I would have broken the next one. I had more belief I was going to break him in the fourth. So it was a tough match, you know. He played really well and I struggled early on, but came through, which is most important.”

The claycourt season officially begins with two events each on the men’s and women’s tours this week: Grand Prix Hassan II Casablanca, Morocco Surface: clay $450,000 ADHEREL Seeds: Stan Wawrinka, Guillermo “G-Lo” Garcia-Lopez, Victor Hanescu, Lukasz Kubot, Paul-Henri Mathieu, Simon Greul, Olivier “The Roach” Rochus, Florent Serra Floaters: Arnaud Clement, Richard Gasquet Notes: Kubot after [...]

No matter what the results, March is a great month for tennis fans.

Quality falls off the table after Sharapova and Oudin — Barrois seeded? Ouch; (1) Sharapova opens against resurgent American Shenay Perry (who had to sit out Fed Cup last weekend with injury) and could face another American in the second round in Mattek-Sands

Notes: Wildcard to Moroccan veteran Younes El Aynaoui; not a whole lot standing between a Federer-Nadal final; two-time defending champ Andy Murray takes a pass?; former champs in the field are Federer (2005-06) and El Aynaoui (2002).