Roger Federer will meet Rafael Nadal in the French Open final after the world number one beat home-favourite Gael Monfils in a four-set semi final at Roland Garros after the Spaniard earlier defeated Serb Novak Djokovic in three sets.
Federer coasted to a one set lead as his opponent took time to settle but Monfils, bidding to become the first Frenchman to win Roland Garros since Yannick Noah in 1983, fought back to take the second 7-5 and battled gamely in the third and fourth but eventually lost out 6-2, 7-5, 6-3, 7-5.
The French Open is the only grand-slam Federer has failed to win and he will be hoping for third time lucky against three-time champion Nadal.
The Spaniard withstood a late fightback by Djokovic to beat the world number three 6-4 6-2 7-6 at the French Open and muscle his way into the final for the fourth consecutive year.
The three-time defending champion saved a set point in the third set to win in two hours 49 minutes and advance to a Sunday's showpiece.
Nadal, who has never been beaten at Roland Garros, was at his brutal best from the start, pulling Serbian Djokovic all over the court and smashing winners on both sides.
One break, in the third game of the match, was enough for Nadal to win the first set. He romped through the second but had to save a set point at 6-5 down before winning the tiebreak 7-3 to reach the final without losing a set for the second successive year.
Many felt the match had all the makings of a classic - world number two versus world number three - but Djokovic was only able to produce his best tennis in the third set and against a claycourt master such as Nadal that was simply never going to be good enough to win.
He tried to attack as often as possible, but certainly for two sets the tactic failed, a first-serve percentage of just 54 not exactly helping him.
Djokovic was regularly picked off or forced into an error at the net in those early stages and despite putting up a fight in te third was unable to recover.
The first set was decided by a solitary break of serve in the third game and Nadal deservedly took it to move in front.
The second seed had dropped just 25 games in five previous rounds - a Grand Slam record in the Open era - and he looked set for another straightforward victory when he stormed through the second set, his wickedly-spun groundstrokes causing Djokovic all sorts of problems.
Djokovic was broken in the opening game and although he fashioned the first break chance of his own in game four, a long return soon saw the opportunity missed.
The constant pressure exerted by Nadal seemed to have got to the Serb and when he lost serve twice at the start of the third set to fall 3-0 behind - Nadal producing some brilliant defence in the process - the game looked up.
However, buoyed by a crowd who had swung firmly behind him, Djokovic launched an unlikely fightback.
Playing his best tennis of the match, he finally broke Nadal's serve for the first time to retrieve one of the breaks and then when Nadal served for the match at 5-4 he struck again.
A tie-break was forced but Nadal duly refocused to kill the match off.
He raced into a 6-0 lead in the breaker and although Djokovic saved three match points, Nadal took the fourth to preserve his unbeaten record at Roland Garros and make it 114 wins from his last 116 claycourt matches.
