Elena Dementieva (RUS)[5] vs Venus Williams (USA)[7]
Jie Zheng (CHN) vs Serena Williams (USA)[6]
There has been an awesome inevitability about the progress of the Williams sisters, Venus and Serena, towards Saturday's women's final. Thursday marks the last chance for the odds to be upset and for a repeat of the 2002 and 2003 "family" finals to be avoided.
So let us examine the prospects of the two ladies whose task it is to attempt to turn back the Williams tsunami: Russia's Elena Dementieva and Zheng Jie of China.
First, Dementieva. This will be her first semi-final in a decade of Wimbledons and on previous form it represents another chance for the 26-year-old - who has swapped Moscow for the tax-free life of Monte Carlo - to live up to her label of the "nearly" lady. This is her 39th Grand Slam and she has yet to win one.
The air of New York appears to suit the Dementieva game most of all: she has had two semi-finals and one final appearance at the US Open, while she also reached the final at Roland Garros in 2004.
Surely, you would think, just one small push would be enough to see Dementieva seize a Slam. And yet, and yet. Tuesday's quarter-final against Nadia Petrova was a classic example of what most ails the 26-year-old Dementieva - a chronic inability to finish off an opponent the way the Williamses do. That, plus a serve that is, to say the least, a touch short of oomph.
This year has been a good one for her, with a ninth career title picked up in Dubai and a return to the top 10. But her difficulties against Venus are starkly revealed in the statistics. Only two of their previous seven matches have resulted in a Russian win and in both of her victories, Dementieva squeaked home in a third-set tie-break, whereas four of the five Williams wins have come in straight sets.
At 5ft 4in, Zheng is the lesser half of the Little and Large semi-final. Lesser in achievement as well as stature, but still a fine athlete with a never-say-die attitude.
The people at the All England Club who dish out wild cards had an inspiration in awarding one to Zheng. It came on the strength of her 2006 doubles win here, a memorable achievement that was followed by a nearly blank 2007 season because of ankle surgery in which her ranking disappeared off the radar.
The fashion in which Zheng saw off her previous five opponents, particularly the top-seeded Ana Ivanovic, was a revelation. She has become the first Chinese, man or woman, to reach a Grand Slam semi-final, winning 10 sets and dropping just one. And everyone's heart went out to her when she announced the dedication of her prize money to the Chinese earthquake disaster relief fund.
Zheng shares a record with Monica Seles as the only other wild card to reach a Grand Slam semi-final, Seles’ coming at the 1995 US Open when she was on her way back after her 1993 stabbing in Hamburg. Should Zheng defeat Serena, she would be Wimbledon's first unseeded finalist.
And so we come to Venus and Serena, who have ruled Wimbledon's roost virtually unchallenged since the start of the century. The kids from Compton, California have transformed women's tennis and, sensibly, now just zero in on the biggest prizes in it, particularly here in London.
Venus, the defending champion, has won Wimbledon four times and Serena twice. Serena's wins came in 2002 and 2003 against her big sister. In only two summers since the millennium, has a Williams not been Wimbledon's champion. It is an extraordinary statistic, oft-repeated in these columns and deservedly so.
The fact that they are seeded sixth and seventh bothers them not a bit. Both have aimed their rackets and their ambitions at finals day on Centre Court from the beginning of the year.
Serena has enjoyed a more successful 2008, with a 30-3 win-loss record, compared to Venus' 19-7. Serena has won six more Grand Slams to add to her brace of Wimbledons, whereas Venus' Wimbledon quadruple is boosted only by a couple of US Opens.
Serena has won all four Slams at least once. Venus has yet to triumph in Australia or Paris but you get the strong impression it doesn't bother her unduly. Another Wimbledon will do very nicely, thanks, until she heads for home in Palm Beach Gardens, Florida, to resume her alternative career, fashion design.
Whether the culmination of Thursday's events will be another all Williams final we shall not know until the end of the day. The pundits say so, but Dementieva and Zheng may yet decree otherwise.
Written by Ronald Atkin
source: http://www.wimbledon.org/en_GB/news/articles/2008-07-02/200807021215021394609.html
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