Serena Williams drops first set but reaches semis

Seven-time champion Serena Williams advanced to the Wimbledon semifinals with a 3-6, 6-3, 6-4 victory over Camila Giorgi of Italy.

Williams dropped her first set at this tournament as the 52ndranked Giorgi produced an impressive display of power and accuracy in the opener.

However, Williams lifted her intensity to level, before closing out the match to move a step closer to reclaiming the title she won in 2016.

The 36-year-old Williams was absent from the All England Club in 2017 due to her pregnancy, and played her first Grand Slam since giving birth at the French Open last month when she reached fourth round.

Julia Goerges advanced to her first Wimbledon semifinal with a 3-6, 7-5, 6-1 victory over 20thseeded Kiki Bertens.

Having reached the first Grand Slam quarterfinal of her career, Goerges went a step further with a comeback victory over her Dutch opponent.

The 13th-seeded Goerges had never made it past the third round in her 10 previous appearances at the All England Club and had gone out in the first round for the past five years.

Goerges will face seven-time champion Serena Williams in the semifinals tomorrow. Williams holds a 3-0 head-to-head record over Goerges, with the most recent victory coming in the third round of the French Open last month.

Angelique Kerber converted her seventh match point to finally get past Daria Kasatkina 6-3, 7-5 and reach the Wimbledon semifinals for the third time.

The No. 11 Kerber was the highest women's seed to reach the quarterfinals; it's the first time since Wimbledon began seeding players in the 1920s that none of the top 10 made it to this round.

She will face No. 12 Jelena Ostapenko for a berth in the final.

Kerber is a former No. 1 and two-time major champion who was the runner-up at the All England Club two years ago and a semifinalist in 2012.

She served for the victory at 5-4, but got broken. When she served for it a second time, she needed to navigate a 16-point game that included five deuces and all of those match points, until forcing a forehand error on the last.

Jelena Ostapenko became the first Latvian woman to reach a Wimbledon semifinal with a 7-5, 6-4 victory over Dominika Cibulkova.

In a match that featured eight breaks of serve — four in the first five games — Ostapenko was able to elevate her game in the crucial moments.

She was the aggressor throughout, hitting 33 winners to Cibulkova's six, but also doubling her opponent's unforced error count.

In 2017, Ostapenko followed up her first Grand Slam title at the French Open by reaching the last eight at Wimbledon.

Roger Federer has been pushed off Wimbledon's Centre Court for the first time in three years.

The eight-time champion is scheduled to play today's quarterfinal against Kevin Anderson on No. 1 Court — his first match away from Wimbledon's showcase venue since 2015.

That year Federer beat Gilles Simon on No. 1 Court in the quarterfinals.