June 08, 2008	Sunday	Jamadi-us-Sani 03, 1429

PARIS, June 7: Top seed Roger Federer of Switzerland overwhelmed Gael Monfils of France in the French Open semi-final on Friday.

Federer will now play triple defending champion Rafael Nadal of Spain in the final on Sunday.

In Friday’s semi-final, Federer won through with an unconvincing 6-2, 5-7, 6-3, 7-5 win over unseeded Gael Monfils.

Monfils had surprised everyone by getting to the last four as the former world junior champion has struggled to make the step up to the senior ranks and only a few weeks ago was playing on the secondary challenger circuit in a bid to revive his flagging fortunes.

But he was immediately in trouble against Federer, who had lost just two sets in his five matches so far, dropping his serve in the opening game and having trouble with his contact lenses as gusts of wind whipped up the red clay dust.

Federer broke again in the seventh game to take the set comfortably in 31 minutes and at the same time quieting the Centre Court home fans on a cool and cloudy afternoon.

Monfils opened the second set with three aces, but two games later he played a poor service game and allowed Federer to break for the third time in the match.

Federer, however, inexplicably gifted the break back in the following game and that appeared to galvanise the Frenchman.

The world No 1’s usually deadly forehand was misfiring badly and he was now the one struggling to save serve.

He did so until the 12th game but with a tie-break beckoning, Monfils lifted his game and levelled the set scores to the biggest cheer of the week on the Centre Court.

Federer edged his nose back in front with a service break in the third game of the third set which he went on to take 6-3 giving himself the opening serve in the fourth set.

The Swiss maestro had to stave off two break points in the third game of the set after some sloppy volleying at the net and a further two, two games later as Monfilss scrambled valiantly to stay in the tie.

The Frenchman incredibly had two more break points on Federer’s next serve and again he failed to take advantage.

Federer then had two match points at 5-4 but failed to convert either of them.

Two games later though he earned his third match point and this time made no mistake.

Results (prefix number denotes seeding):

Men’s singles (semi-final):

1-Roger Federer (Switzerland) bt Gael Monfils (France) 6-2, 5-7, 6-3, 7-5.

Women’s doubles (final):

10-Anabel Medina/Virginia Ruano (Spain) bt Casey Dellacqua/Francesca Schiavone (Australia/Italy) 2-6, 7-5, 6-4.—Agencies