Justine Henin BEL (1) vs. Marion Bartoli FRA (18).
Unfortunately, the Serena Williams-Justine Henin quarterfinal did not live up to the breathless hype for the second Grand Slam in a row. This time Serena was clearly injured and in her press conference describe herself at being "40 to 50 percent" due to a strained thumb which occurred in the third set of an amazingly dramatic three-set victory over Daniela Hantuchova on Monday. Even so, Justine was barely able to pull out a tight win 6-4, 3-6, 6-3 after losing serve the first time she served for her first non-clay surface victory over Serena Williams. MadProfessah was pretty sure that Marion Bartoli would not be able to last against the genetically gifted Michaella Krajicek in the quarterfinals, but I was wrong and the Frenchwoman won 3-6, 6-3, 6-2. This was not the French player that commentators expected to make the semi-finals of Wimbledon this year, although Bartoli did make the semi-finals of the grass-court warmup Eastbourne, losing easily to Henin 6-1, 6-3 in a match which was not as close as the score appears. There's no reason why the Belgian will not repeat the deed to make a Federerian sixth consecutive Grand Slam final. PREDICTION: Henin in 2 sets.
Ana Ivanovic SRB (6) vs. Venus Williams USA (23). The Serbian beauty is in her second consecutive Grand Slam final thanks to an epic collapse by Czech teen phenom Nicole Vaidisova who served for the match at 5-3 in the third set and blew three match points before succumbing 4-6, 6-2, 7-5 with a double fault on Ivanovic's second match point. Ouch. After playing one of her best tennis matches in years to demolish reigning U.S. Open champion Maria Sharapova 6-1, 6-3 on July 4th, Venus Williams is clearly on her way to her 6th Wimbledon final (and possibly 4th title) in nine years. Venus had 22 winners to 14 unforced errors, +8(!), with 6 in the first set and 8 in the second. I have never seen Venus averaging less than one unforced error per game, ever. This was an even more dominating performance over Sharapova than her Wimbledon semifinal 7-6(2), 6-1 win which MadProfessah labelled the 3rd best WTA Tour match of 2005. Her average first serve speed was 115 miles per hour, which matches Sharapova's fastest serve (Venus hit several serves over 120 mph, peaking at 126 mph). Clearly the Williams sister bring a special focus to matches against the Russian "It" girl who supplanted them as the most prominent female athlete in the world in 2004. Sharapova is 0-3 against Williams sisters this years and has won a combined nine games in six sets of tennis! Venus followed up that performance by defeating 2004 U.S. Open champion Svetlana Kuznetsova 6-3, 6-4 with 23 winners and 20 errors. A Williams sister with more winners than errors is not going to lose to any other player on the WTA tour, especially not on Centre Court at Wimbledon. And not one whom she holds a 2-0 career head-to-head edge over. PREDICTION: Williams in 3 sets.
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