Kiwi Michael Venus, right, and Ryan Harrison will face a fellow unseeded pair in the French Open men's doubles final.

Michael Venus is "still in shock" after earning the chance to claim New Zealand's first grand slam tennis title since 1979.

Venus and American partner Ryan Harrison reached the French Open men's doubles final with a 4-6 6-3 6-4 victory over 16th-seeded Colombians Juan Sebastian Cabal and Robert Farah on Suzanne Lenglen Court on Friday (Saturday NZ Time) in Paris.

Venus, a 29-year-old Aucklander, appeared to be stunned at the result.

"This is unbelievable. Coming in to this I hadn't won a set here, so I'm just so excited to be here."

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The unseeded pair will face Mexican Santiago Gonzalez and American Donald Young, who defeated Fernando Verdasco and Nemanja Zimonjic 24 hours earlier, in the final on Saturday.

In a tight match, Venus and Harrison recovered from dropping the first set to pick up a vital service break in the second and third sets to claim victory in 1 hour 56 minutes.

All five of Venus and Harrison's matches at Roland Garros have gone to three sets, including victories over the fourth, seventh and 16th-seeded pairings.

"It was another tough match. We've gone three sets in every one so far," Venus said.

"We lost the first set but said to each other: 'it's been like this each match, so let's just enjoy it, dig deep and see what happens'.

In the first set Venus and Harrison got off to a shaky start with Venus having his serve broken in the third game and the Colombians looked sharp to take the set 6-4 in 36 minutes.

However, the second set saw Cabal get broken in the second game and from there the Kiwi-American duo held serve and Venus served to force a deciding set, 6-3.

The final set went serve-for-serve until the ninth game when Cabal was broken with some superb teamwork by Venus and Harrison.

Venus, 29, then had to hold his nerve to serve out the match. Cabal and Farah managed one break point chance but Venus was able to deny them and then served out the match.

Harrison, who generally concentrates on singles, summed up the match for the pair.

"It couldn't be more special to win this with Mike. We had to play well to win this and we're going to go for it in the final."

Reaching the final will see the 29-year-old Aucklander's current world doubles ranking of 39 move well inside the top-30 and gain a significant chunk of prizemoney too. The winners of the French Open title share €540,000 (NZ$840,000) and runners-up €270,000 (NZ$420,000).

Onny Parun is New Zealand's only modern-era men's grand slam winner, teaming with Australian Dick Crealy to win the 1974 French Open men's doubles in five sets. Parun also reached the Australian Open singles final in 1973, beaten by Australian John Newcombe in four sets, while Chris Lewis reached the men's singles final at Wimbledon in 1983, beaten by John McEnroe in straight sets.

Christchurch-born Anthony Wilding won six singles and five doubles grand slam titles between 1906 and 1914.

Judy Chaloner was the last Kiwi to win a grand slam title, in the women's doubles at the 1979 Australian Open.