Richard Gasquet stayed in the hunt for a third consecutive Open Sud de France title by beating Kenny de Schepper, while compatriots Jo-Wilfried Tsonga and Benoit Paire are also through to the semifinal in their homeland.
Gasquet has won the ATP 250 tournament in three of the last four years and moved a step closer to yet another success in Montpellier by seeing off another Frenchman in the form of De Schepper 6-2 5-7 6-4.
De Schepper saved as many as 17 break points and served 16 aces in a powerful performance, but the qualifier was unable to claim the scalp of the third seed.
Paire should be fresh for his last-four match against Gasquet after he played just one game of his quarterfinal before Dustin Brown retired due to a back injury.
Second seed Tsonga needed just 67 minutes to march into the last four at the expense of Daniil Medvedev, who went down 6-2 7-5.
Tsonga will fancy his chances of claiming a first title since 2015 following an ominous display in which he did not face a solitary break point and will now face Alexander Zverev, who ensured there will be one non-French player in the semifinal by ousting Jeremy Chardy.
Grigor Dimitrov maintained his impressive start to the season by beating birthday boy Viktor Troicki 6-3 6-3 to reach the semi-finals of the Sofia Open.
Dimitrov won the Brisbane International before reaching the semifinal of the Australian Open and will now face Nikoloz Basilashvili on home soil after the Georgian recovered from a poor start to defeat Martin Klizan 0-6 6-3 6-3.
David Goffin won an all-Belgian clash with Steve Darcis 6-1 6-3 to set up a meeting with Roberto Bautista Agut, who beat Gilles Muller in straight sets.
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