Alexander Zverev’s march towards an expected first grand slam title continued with a semi-final victory over Jakub Mensik.
The second seed is trying to shake off the tag of best male player never to win a slam, and the tennis gods appear to be smiling on him in Paris.
Zverev has seen his big rivals for the title fall away while he has eased through the draw, dropping just two sets, and he overcame a third-set wobble in a 7-5 6-2 3-6 6-3 success against 26th seed Mensik.
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The 20-year-old Czech has announced himself as a likely major contender in the near future this fortnight, knocking out Alex De Minaur, Andrey Rublev and fellow young gun Joao Fonseca.
His run has been all the more impressive considering Mensik needed a wheelchair to get back to the locker room after collapsing in the heat after his second-round match.
But he had spent four hours more on court in reaching the last four than Zverev and he could not sustain the consistent level needed to really challenge the German.
Sunday will be Zverev’s fourth slam final and second in Paris after he lost to Carlos Alcaraz from two-sets-to-one up two years ago.
He came even closer in his maiden final against Dominic Thiem at the US Open in 2020, blowing a two-set lead and losing in a deciding tie-break, while he was well beaten by Jannik Sinner in the Australian Open final last year.
It appeared Zverev may have built up too much scar tissue ever to take the final step but patience looks to have paid off, and he will be a huge favourite against whichever Italian out of Flavio Cobolli and Matteo Arnaldi he faces in the final.
For 10 games this was a tight, high-quality contest, with both men looking to use their fearsome backhands and catch each other out with drop shots.
Had Mensik taken one of three chances to break at 4-3, things might have played out differently, but he was a little passive and paid the price three games later.
Two double faults opened the door for Zverev and the German took his opportunity before sealing the set with an ace after exactly an hour.
The energy that Mensik had mustered at the start of the contest seemed to drain out of him through the second set and he took a medical timeout at 2-1 in the third for what appeared to be a neck issue.
Zverev was so in control that the crowd looked in danger of nodding off en masse but they were roused back to life when the world number three lost concentration, Mensik broke serve for the first time and suddenly the Czech had a set on the board.
But the hope that a meaningful contest might develop lasted only as long as it took Zverev to break serve in the second game of the fourth set.
British umpire James Keothavong was kept busy adjudicating on a number of close calls, several of which brought him into conflict with Zverev, while he also gave the German a time violation for taking too long changing his racket.
But this time the 29-year-old avoided any dips, converting his first match point when Mensik netted a backhand.
