Gael Monfils, the long shot French Open semifinalist from France, is a fan of hockey. Let’s imagine, then, what Monfils might be like if he had dedicated his life to sticks and pucks rather than rackets and balls. At 6-feet-4-inches and 180 pounds, he’d be one of the most imposing and strongest athletes in the sport. He’d also skate faster than anyone — on the clay of Roland Garros, he seems to skate more than run. Scouts sizing up a man of Monfils’s talent would project him as a star forward in the NHL, perhaps even a scoring leader, if not for one small problem: Monfils would insist on playing goalie.

This has been the trouble with Monfils, the former top junior in the world, since he became a professional. He hits his forehand has hard as anyone in the world — that is, when he wants to. Same for his backhand and his serve. He runs faster than anyone on the tour. He can be deadly at the net, where his seemingly elastic limbs intercept would-be passing shots. Yet Monfils grew up playing a game that suits a man 5 inches shorter and half as strong, and he has stuck with it, despite the urging of numerous coaches over the years (he split with Thierry Champion a few years ago, but recently returned to him after flunking four other coaches along the way). Built like an attacker, Monfils prefers to defend than destroy, to aggravate rather than assault. He usually does this from 15 feet behind the baseline, so far that the bottoms of his legs sometimes disappear from the television screen. He loops many of his shots high over the net. He is the ultimate pusher.

Long term, this style likely will not allow Monfils to become the sort of champion many believed he might be when he dominated the junior rankings. In Paris, though, where the clay eases the strain on his tendons (he slides on hard courts, too) and buys him time, and where the expansive main stadium gives him room to range far and wide for any shot his opponent might hit, Monfils is a threat — even to Roger Federer, his semifinal opponent. If Federer has a slow start, as he did in the quarterfinals, this match could be a lot closer than it’s expected to be.

As much as Monfils can cause onlookers to wonder why it is he plays a game so out of sync with his body, he is nonetheless a captivating presence on the court. No ball seems out of reach, no angle impossible. Monfils’s chosen method might not be the wisest, but it is singular. It’s for this reason that Monfils is a welcome addition to a final weekend that also includes the three men we all expected to come this far. I’m hard-pressed to remember a French Open where the end of the men’s event had such potential for excitement and drama. Federer is still in search of the one major title he hasn’t won. Rafael Nadal has won this title three years in a row and has looked better than ever so far. Novak Djokovic would take over the no. 2 ranking if he defeats Nadal today; more important than that, if he defeats Nadal and then wins this title, he’ll rightly be considered the best player in the world at the moment, no matter what the rankings say. This final stretch of the French Open, considering all that’s at stake, is the most important time in men’s tennis since Federer became no. 1 four years ago.

The women’s tour, meanwhile, has anointed its third no. 1 in less than a month. Justine Henin had the top spot when she retired. Maria Sharapova took it from there, but lost in the fourth round to Dinara Safina. The ranking now belongs to Ana Ivanovic, who battled nerves yesterday in a 6-4, 3-6, 6-4 victory over fellow Serbian Jelena Jankovic.

Ivanovic is the first Serbian to reach the top of the rankings, but she didn’t go to Paris, where she lost in the final last year, with that goal in mind. She’s after her first major title, and now has a third chance to win it. In her two previous major finals, in Paris last year and at the Australian Open this year, she was an underdog. On Saturday, though, she’ll be the favorite against Safina, who yesterday decided she had stared down enough match points this week (she saved one against Sharapova and another in her quarterfinal match against Dementieva). Safina dismissed Svetlana Kuznetsova with 39 winners, 6-3, 6-2. For Safina, the victory puts her one win from a historic moment in tennis: If she wins this title, she and her brother, Marat Safin, will be the first siblings to win major titles in singles.

Safina has a lot of Marat in her. She’s athletic and powerful, but also prone to cold spells and volcanic outbursts. Ivanovic will have the advantage in the final for the simple reason that she has been there before. But like everything in women’s tennis at the moment, this match is a toss-up.

Mr. Perrotta is a senior editor at Tennis magazine. He can be reached at tperrotta@tennismagazine.com.