WATCH: Paire, Monfils put on Hot Shot show in Paris

There are a few names that, when they pop up on the order of play, tennis fans know to go on high alert for something wildly entertaining. One of them is Benoit Paire, the fieryFrenchman who's as combustible as he is brilliant. Another is Gael Monfils, who never fails to entertain.

Put them together on the same court, both on home soil in front of a Paris crowd—that's when something ridiculous is bound to happen.

Case in point: In their second-round battle at the Paris Masters, on Wednesday, Paire was a game away from elimination. That didn't stop him, though, from serving-and-volleying, then answering an impeccable Monfils lob with a gutsy tweener and, finally—with opponent Monfils at the net ready to pounce on anything soft—immediately following with a jumping, front-facing between-the-legs shot, with just enough pace and placement to be out of Monfils' leaping distance.

It was a shot so spectacular that Monfils, still on the ground from his dive out of bounds, had to join the audience in applause.

But they can't all be gems: Earlier in the set, serving-and-volleying down 1-2, Paire took a weak Monfils return and tried to slice a drop shot with such severity that it'd bounce back over the net and give Monfils no chance to touch it. The problem: It didn't clear the net in the first place.

Four games later, Paire was serving-and-volleying again—except, instead of a traditional volley, he went for an emphatic slam dunk, a move that, really, belongs only to Monfils. That one didn't work out for him, either, the ball deflecting off Paire's frame and into the bottom of the net. But, by the look of his heavily bearded face, Paire didn't seem too bothered by the miss.

In the end, it was Monfils who had the last laugh, having taken the match, 6-4, 7-6 (4). In the third round in Paris, he faces Radu Albot to end Thursday's night session.