FanHouse Gael Monfils

PARIS (AP) -- Third-seeded Novak Djokovic scrambled to a 6-2, 5-7, 7-6 (3) victory over local favorite Gael Monfils on Sunday to win the Paris Masters for the first time.

The victory gave Djokovic back-to-back ATP Tour titles after his win over top-ranked Roger Federer in the Swiss Indoors final last Sunday.

The third-ranked Djokovic also beat World No. 2 Rafael Nadal in the semifinals in Paris and will be a strong favorite when he'll try to defend his title at the eight-man ATP World Tour Finals from Nov. 22-29 in London.

PARIS (AP) -- Novak Djokovic overpowered Rafael Nadal 6-2, 6-3 Saturday to reach the Paris Masters final for the first time.

The Serb will face Gael Monfils of France on Sunday. He advanced to the final with a 6-4, 5-7, 6-4 win over Radek Stepanek.

Djokovic is 3-0 overall against Monfils.

"He is one of the players who is very unpredictable," Djokovic said. "He can play really, really fast. And with a big serve, he can do a lot of damage to opponents."

Rafael Nadal beat Gael Monfils Tuesday to advance to the quarterfinals of the U.S. Open, but what's really getting attention this morning is what happened after the match, when a man ran out of the stands and onto the court, hugging and kissing Nadal before security could restrain him.

LONDON (AP) -- Gael Monfils of France has pulled out of Wimbledon due to a wrist injury.

Tournament organizers announced his withdrawal on Thursday. His place in the men's singles draw will go to a loser from the qualifying rounds.

The withdrawal comes a week after the 14th-ranked Frenchman had to pull out of his scheduled match against Belgian Steve Darcis in the last 16 of the Queen's Club tournament.

American tennis sat on its chair begging to stop the fight. What an image. It was too dark to see. Yes, that was the problem. That had to be it.

It couldn't have been that Andy Roddick, the face and caretaker of the U.S. men's game, was hopelessly losing. And panicking.

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There was one Frenchmen and one American left at the French Open in Paris as Andy Roddick and Gael Monfils took to the clay Monday night, but Roddick couldn't muster the magic that he'd brought to the early matches at Roland Garros and Monfils couldn't miss.

Monfils, with his quick-footed play and jubilant attitude, never seemed to give Roddick an inch, taking down Andy 6-4, 6-2, 6-3 as light was fading on the beautiful Paris skyline.

Gael Monfils delivered the best highlight of this year's French Open on Saturday when he slid for one shot and dove for another to win a point on his way to defeating Austria's Jürgen Melzer, 6-2, 4-6, 6-3, 6-1.

I think it's safe to say that for most Americans, the Australian Open is something of the lost Grand Slam of tennis. Played for the most part while most of America is snug in bed in the middle of Winter in the Northern Hemisphere, it's easy to forgive most folks for having the NFL Playoffs, the NBA and NCAA Basketball on their minds this time of year.

That's too bad, especially this year as the Australian Open features at least one quirky story that tennis fans ought to be paying attention to, at least outside of Serena Williams needing a course in remedial blogging. What I'm talking about is the interesting men's doubles pairing of 6-10 Ivo Karlovic and 6-9 John Isner.

As Joe Fleming of USA Today wrote yesterday:

Consider: With their wingspans - Karlovic about 7 feet, 2 1/2 inches and Isner 7-1 1/2 - plus an additional 27 inches of racket on either side, they can gobble up nearly two-thirds of the 36-foot width of the court. One big step covers the rest.

And both can bring 130- to 140-mph heat on their serves; Karlovic led the ATP Tour in aces in 2007 (1,318 total, 20.6 a match).

That's the two of them pictured above with Justin Heinz, the shortest ball boy at the Open this year.