Wimbledon Day 9: Girls, Girls, Girls... But surprisingly no drama...

Boring day, I should say?

And the results were predictable too...

Besides Dinara Safina, who was made to sweat by Sabine Lisicki, other favourites easily sailed through to the semifinals.

Safina who thought she was a Santa Claus on court yesterday, served 15 double-faults!

However, the top-ranked Russian reached the Wimbledon semifinals for the first time after a 6-7 (5), 6-4, 6-1 victory of unseeded Lisicki.

Venus Williams, the favourite to win the Wimbledon again seems too hot for Agnieszka Radwanska to handle.

Venus won 6-1, 6-2.

Venus's baby sister Serena who was out on a revenge against Victoria Azarenka with a 6-2, 6-3 win.

Serena admitted that the heavy defeat inflicted on her by Azarenka earlier this year in the Miami final did much to fuel her victory.

Finally Elena Dementieva also performed a "Williams" demolition job on Francesca Schiavone, winning 6-2, 6-2.

Tonight the gentlemen will play for places in the semifinals.

(Images by Getty Images)

Serena & Venus Williams: Sisters love

Venus Williams got out from the shower in time to catch baby sister Serena on court with Victoria Azarenka.

Earlier Venus had an easy win over Agnieszka Radwanska 6-1, 6-2 in the quarterfinal round.

Now, since we're already in July, the US Open series and US Open are coming up. So, here's a video of Serena talking about the love she has for Venus in anticipation of the events.

(Images by Hamish Blair/Getty Images)

Tennis chicks at Sony Ericsson Open Kickoff Party

This is the continuous from the previous post here.

Check out the girls on the red carpet at the kickoff party, at the Fountainbleu Hotel in club LIV prior to the 2009 Sony Ericsson Open in Miami, Florida.

Fyi, I've filtered out the bad ones and leave the hot ones here ;)

Dominika Cibulkova is like the Eva Longoria of tennis. Looking at her picture here, I can't help but imagine her in a sexy nurse outfit.

Agnieszka Radwanska maybe out of the WTA top 10 in the latest but she's in my top 5 favourite WTA ladies.

Dark-haired Russian hottie Anastasia Pivovarova is chic and glam in that green dress.

Caroline Wozniacki injects some cuteness on the red carpet.

Double thumbs up from Nole!

(Images by Marc Serota/Getty Images for Sony Ericsson)

Defending champion Dmitry Tursunov at the official draw of Medibank International Sydney

Dmitry Tursunov and Svetlana Kuznetsova were at the Myer Department Store in Sydney's city centre.

They were getting some help from fans in conducting the official draw. There was an also autograph session with the players including Mario Ancic and Agnieszka Radwanska.

Check out the draws and OOP here.

Dima will be defending his title here. He's definitely an interesting player to watch out for, whether it's on court or off court. If you have missed his 'off court adventurous ride' recently in MTF or DtL, check it out here. Click for a larger version.


(Images via Medibank Sydney website, downthelinetennis)

WTA Championships: Ana Ivanovic gets her cake then pulls out; Serena Williams withdraws too

We don't get to see Fernando Verdasco celebrating Ana Ivanovic's 21st birthday.

Instead WTA boss Larry Scott and tournament director Karim Alami were the guys celebrating Ivanovic's birthday at the VIP Village of the Khalifa International Tennis Complex.

They presented her with a cake, shaped like a tennis racquet, made by Le Notre Paris.

The bad news is Ivanovic announced today that she has withdrawn from the Sony Ericsson Championships due to a virus.

The 20-year-old beauty has felt unwell throughout her stay in Doha and was affected by illness in her opening two round-robin matches.

Good for Agniezka Radwanska though as she will take on Svetlana Kuznetsova in Ivanovic's place.

"It's obviously, very, very hard for me," said Ivanovic.

"After the other night's match, it was a very intense and long match. I actually started to feel worse. Yesterday I didn't feel good, and today even worse."

"I tried to hit yesterday actually. I was on the court for about ten minutes, and as long as I didn't move it was okay. But if I tried to hit a little bit harder or to move to the side, it was impossible to do."

"Even if I were to step on the court [tonight], I wouldn't even be able to go through a few games."

The withdrawal is obviously a disappointing and sad ending to an otherwise glorious season.

But 2008 isn't all bad as Ivanovic won her first ever Grand Slam title and reached No.1 in the world (plus she also pocketed $100,000 at Doha despite the disappointing result).

She said: "Even though I had a tough few months, I still think this was the best year of my career so far. I won a Grand Slam, and I reached the position of No. 1. So there's lots of positive things to take from this year."

In another shocking withdrawal, Serena Williams cited a stomach injury when she pulled out of her match at the Sony Ericsson Championships against Elena Dementieva, who advanced to the semifinals.

“I did feel pain last night,” the U.S. Open champion said.

“I was still in pain just getting out of bed.”

Williams lost to her sister, Venus, 5-7, 6-1, 6-0 on Thursday.

Serena said she might have tweaked a muscle and that doctors had told her to rest.

(Via AP, Ana Ivanovic website, Images via zimbio.com, Yahoo! Sport)

Agnieszka Radwanska slams Jelena Jankovic in the face

And that's in a form of a yellow tennis ball (hehehe!).

Agnieszka Radwanska definitely has a sense of humour.

Or perhaps she's telling us something here.

The retirement of Justine Henin has resulted in a stiff competition for the WTA no.1 position among many players including Ana Ivanovic, Serena Williams and Jankovic.

And Jankovic is considered the last man standing after winning 3 titles in a row and hold on tight to the no. 1 place.

Sometimes it can be lonely at the top.

Especially after a series of battles to the top, you could have made quite a number of 'enemies' along the way. If you know what I mean ;)

Now, I wonder how Jelena will react to this. I bet she's not going to be impressed by the drawing for sure.

By the way the drawing will be auctioned for the benefit of a local children's charity at Linz, Austria. It could snatch the highest bid!

(Via Women's Tennis Blog)