Wimbledon: Semifinals

Well, tonight you finally get a post from me and its going to be a hodge podge of information.  First off, here are your semifinalists at Wimbledon

Men
1) Rafael Nadal (ESP): 16th slam semifinal (5th at Wimbledon), 12-3 record (4-0), last '11 French Open, 2nd consecutive
2) Novak Djokovic (SRB): 12th slam semifinal (3rd at Wimbledon), 4-7 record (0-2), last '11 French Open, 5th consecutive
4) Andy Murray (GBR):  7th slam semifinal (3rd at Wimbledon), 3-3 record (0-2), last '11 French Open, 3rd consecutive
12) Jo-Wilfried Tsonga (FRA):  3rd slam semifinal (1st at Wimbledon), 1-1 record

These four look familiar when compared to the semifinalists at Wimbledon in 2010.  Nadal, Djokovic, and Murray were all there, along with Berdych who was, like Tsonga, the 12th seed.  Interestingly, for the last five slams at least 3 of the Big 4 have made the semis:  '10 Wimbledon (Nadal, Djokovic, Murray), '10 US Open (Nadal, Djokovic, Federer), '11 AO (Djokovic, Federer, Murray), '11 French (all 4).

This brings me to an interesting statistic:  Tsonga reached his 3rd slam semifinal.  This puts him above all of his active colleagues except the Big 4 and a few of the "old guard" still around i.e. Hewitt, Roddick, Nalbandian, Ferrero.  Here are the active semis leaders:
Federer-28, Nadal-16, Djokovic-12, Roddick-10, Hewitt-8, Murray-7, Ferrero-6, Nalbandian-5, Davydenko-4, Tsonga-3, eight others-2

Women
4) Victoria Azarenka (BLR): 1st slam semifinal
5) Maria Sharapova (RUS): 12th slam semifinal (4th at Wimbledon), 4-7 record (1-2), last '11 French Open, 2nd consecutive
8) Petra Kvitova (CZE): 2nd slam semifinal (2nd at Wimbledon), 0-1 record (0-1), last '10 Wimbledon
Sabine Lisicki (GER): 1st slam semifinal

Three of these women have found success at Wimbledon in the past.  Sharapova won her first slam here back in '04 at the age of 17.  Both Kvitova and Lisicki were 19 in their previous deep runs here ('10 SF for Kvitova, '09 QF for Lisicki) both as unseeded players.  So while we don't see 3 of the 4 seeds for the women as we do for the men, finding these four in the semis is not altogether a surprising result.  Even Lisicki was a dark horse pick by several pundits.  And Azarenka has been one of the hottest players this year, when she hasn't been retiring with injuries.

Enjoy the semifinals over the next 2 days:  Nadal/Murray, Djokovic/Tsonga, Sharapova/Lisicki, Azarenka/Kvitova

Now a shout out to those losing quarterfinalists since I missed those posts:

Men
3) Roger Federer (SUI):  33rd slam quarterfinal (29th consecutive, 9th at Wimbledon)
10) Mardy Fish (USA):  3rd slam quarterfinal (1st at Wimbledon)
Feliciano Lopez (ESP):  3rd slam quarterfinal (all at Wimbledon)
Bernard Tomic (AUS):  1st slam quarterfinal

Federer's astounding slam consistency continues with his 29th consecutive quarterfinal.  The man hasn't missed a quarter for over 7 years ('04 French Open).  Fish becomes the American to reach a slam quarter since Roddick at the '10 Aussie Open.  Is Tomic finally ready to become Hewitt's successor for Australia?  He'll move well into the top 100.  Lopez put together another nice run at Wimbledon.

Women
9) Marion Bartoli (FRA)
24) Dominika Cibulkova (SVK)
32) Tsvetana Pironkova (BUL)
Tamira Paszek (AUT)

Bartoli has been on fire this year, making the Indian Wells final, French Open semis, Eastbourne champion, and now Wimbledon quarterfinal with a win over Serena.  Cibulkova continues to progress and will be back in the top 20 now.  Pironkova showed us '10 wasn't a fluke and she really does like the grass (and playing Venus).  Is Paszek going to be another young star on the tour?

A few more comments before I quit typing:
-I was surprised by the early exit of Zvonareva.  I thought despite her struggles over the last couple months she would do well on the faster courts.  Now she has a boatload of points to defend through the end of the year so we'll see if she brings it or if her ranking plummets.
-I was less surprised by the early exit of Li, but that was due in part to her opponent Lisicki who made QF in Wimbledon in '09 and won a grass title this year in Birmingham.
-Cibulkova recorded her second win over Wozniacki this year (also in Sydney), further extracting revenge for her QF loss at the US Open.
-Paszek and Lisicki were the first unseeded quarterfinalists at a slam this year for the women.  By contrast, the men have had some of those at every slam this year (Dolgopolov at the Aussie Open, Chela at the French Open, and now both Lopez and Tomic).
-American men continued to show off their grass prowess despite their overall fall in the rankings over the past few months.  Five Yankees made the second round (Fish, Roddick, Isner, Bogomolov, Sweeting) and three (Fish, Roddick, Bogomolov) progressed to the third before only Fish made the 4th and then the QF.  Nadal had to beat three Americans to make the SF (Russell, Sweeting, Fish).
-American women not named Williams continued to slump despite an increased presence in the top 100. Only one (McHale) would make round two (despite Mattek-Sands being seeded) though Riske gets an honorable mention for taking '10 finalist Zvonareva to 3 sets.