Gilles Simon battles past Nicolas Mahut to reach French Open fourth round

Gilles Simon has fought his way into the fourth round of the French Open with a 6-2 6-7(6) 6-7(6) 6-3 6-1 triumph over Nicolas Mahut.

Simon came out of the blocks firing as he snatched his opponent's serve at the first time of asking and Mahut failed to recover as he dropped serve again three games later.

Both players lost serve in the second, meaning that a tie-break was needed to separate the two, and it was Mahut who came out on top to draw level on sets.

Nothing could separate the two in the third set and another tie-break was put into action and despite losing serve four times, Mahut broke back on five occasions to edge into the lead.

Simon wasn't done though, as the Frenchman recovered from losing serve twice to seal the fourth set and push the contest into a decider, which the 30 year-old eased through to claim a place in the next round.