Richard Gasquet, the nearly man over the past decade, is one step away from a first grand slam final after the Frenchman came from two sets to one down to beat the No4 seed Stan Wawrinka in a shot-making extravaganza.
The 29-year-old, who has struggled to fulfil the talent he showed as a teenager, won 6-4, 4-6, 3-6, 6-4, 11-9 to reach the last four at Wimbledon for the second time, and eight years after the first.
Having taken out the new “bad boy” of tennis, Nick Kyrgios, in the previous round, the No21 seed looked beaten when the French Open champion hit back from the loss of the first set to win the next two comfortably.