Soccer - Monaco down Lille to reach French Cup semis

PARIS (Reuters) - Monaco reached the semi-finals of the French Cup with a 2-1 home win against Lille on Tuesday as Valere Germain's double helped them rebound from their League Cup final misery.

Forward Germain scored twice in the first half as Monaco overwhelmed a Lille side who were reduced to 10 men after defender Carlens Arcus was sent off five minutes before the interval.

Monaco looked nothing like the side who were beaten 4-1 in the League Cup final by Paris St Germain on Saturday as they joined En Avant Guingamp, 1-0 winners at fourth division Frejus-St Raphael, in the last four.

Germain opened the scoring in the 35th minute with a missile into the roof of the net from just outside of the box after eluding two defenders.

Arcus was shown a straight red card for fouling Jorge, who was charging towards the box after being set up by Nabil Dirar.

Germain doubled the lead on the stroke of halftime with a fine volley from Irvin Cardona's cross from the right.

Anwar El Ghazi reduced the arrears four minutes into stoppage time but it was too little, too late for Lille.

On Wednesday, defending champions PSG travel to third division Avranches without captain Thiago Silva, who is injured, and Angel Di Maria, who has been left out of the squad.

Angers take on Girondins de Bordeaux in the other quarter-final on Wednesday.

(Reporting by Julien Pretot; Editing by Toby Davis)