Andy Roddick was forced to battle through five sets to defeat Sebastien Grosjean 3-6, 6-2, 6-1, 3-6, 6-3 on Wednesday and take his place in the Wimbledon semi-finals for the third successive year.
The American second seed had not lost a set to his practice partner in five matches but that streak was swiftly brought to an end as the 27-year-old Frenchman's flamboyant game gave him an early lead.
Former U.S. Open champion Roddick, runner-up to Roger Federer last year, then cranked up his formidable serve and took the second set with some ease as Grosjean lost his self-belief.
The 22-year-old Roddick looked to be strolling through to his fourth grand slam semi-final when he walked away with the third set but he suffered a lapse of concentration and Grosjean claimed the fourth.
An early break in the decisive fifth put Roddick on course for a semi-final match against Swede Thomas Johansson. He secured it with a huge serve on his first match point.
Former Australian Open champion Johansson reached his first Wimbledon semi-final, downing a sluggish David Nalbandian 7-6, 6-2, 6-2.
A veteran of nine Wimbledon campaigns, 30-year-old Johansson looked entirely at ease on a sunny Court One after a brief early break for a passing shower.
The Swede has a fine grass pedigree having won the 2001 tournaments in Halle and at Nottingham and reached the final at Nottingham in 2004.
Against Nalbandian, no slouch on grass himself having reached the final here in 2002, he used his fine return to wear his opponent down and mixed up play intelligently from the back of the court.
"I'm so surprised. I didn't think I was going to do it," a grinning Johansson said as he left the court. "I'm happy to be the oldest guy in it."
Johansson, who won in Melbourne in 2002, is the first Swede since Stefan Edberg in 1993 to reach a Wimbledon semi-final, where he will meet Andy Roddick or Sebastien Grosjean.
He said the court was playing fairly slowly so he did not have to use Edberg's serve and volley tactics.
Johansson broke Nalbandian's serve in the third game of the first set and after that the Argentine always looked on the back foot.
The 23-year-old, seeded 18 here, levelled things in the seventh game but errors let him down in the tiebreak which Johansson won with his fourth break point when Nalbandian sent a backhand wide.
The Swede waltzed through the second set after going 3-0 up, Nalbandian surrendering it tamely with an error into the net on his own serve.
Two breaks in the third and Johansson, whose best previous performances here were fourth-round finishes in 1996 and 2000, was home and dry.