No all-Williams final at Wimbledon

The five-times champion and second seed Venus Williams loses to Bulgaria's Tsvetana Pironkova in the quarter-finals of Wimbledon today.

It is the second time in three matches the 22-year-old Pironkova, above, has defeated Williams.

Venus Williams, five times the queen of Wimbledon and a finalist on three other occasions, suffered one of her greatest humiliations yesterday in the 14 years that she has been gracing the lawns of the All England Club. Beaten on her debut appearance here back in 1997, Williams has only twice since failed to get past the third round. Once she gets going on a surface she needs time to adjust to, she takes some stopping and only her younger sister, Serena, has had the measure of her at the sharp end of the tournament. So, when the American walked out to face the unheralded Bulgarian Tsvetana Pironkova, at 82nd the lowest ranked of the eight players who had reached the quarter-finals, another straightforward stride towards a scheduled fifth final against her sister beckoned. Pironkova had other ideas, however. Confidence lifted by the memory of a first-round triumph over Williams in the 2006 Australian Open, she dominated the No 2 seed with an array of punishing ground strokes, particularly on her backhand, and took full advantage of an embarrassing unforced-error count of 29 from her opponent. Pironkova, who made just six unforced errors, could hardly believe what was happening as she swept Williams off the court 6-2, 6-3 in 85 minutes.

"Everyone is so happy back home," said a delighted Pironkova, who had never before been past the second round in a grand slam event. "Nobody expected me to play in the semi-finals at Wimbledon and to beat Venus Williams like that. When I came here I was only hoping to win two rounds. The semi-finals looked very far away." Williams offered no excuses, not even the ready-made one resulting from her clutching her back in apparent pain early in the contest. "I didn't do myself any favours out there," she said. "It was not a good match for me. I don't think I did anything right today. Obviously beforehand I felt that this was the kind of match I could win but I just didn't get enough balls in play." Pironkova, 22, who arrived here having amassed career earnings of US$899,000 (Dh3.3m) compared to Wiliams's haul of more than $27m, can be confident of giving her bank balance a further boost tomorrow when she takes on Russia's Vera Zvonareva, who caused another surprise by ending the hopes of Kim Clijsters.

The Belgian, still in the first year of a comeback that brought swift rewards with a second US Open success last September, had been expected to be the biggest threat to the Williams sisters here. She and Williams will now have to watch the 21st-seeded Zvonareva try to improve on a miserable record in this tournament by endorsing her 61-place ranking advantage over Pironkova. After yesterday's shocks it is hard to look beyond a safe defence of the title for Serena Willliams. The world No 1 was initially concerned by the confident ball striking of Li Na in their Centre Court tussle, but as the going got tough towards the end of the opening set, the ninth-seeded Chinese was found wanting and the champion eased to a 7-5, 6-3 victory. Serena, who spoke to her vanquished sister in the locker room before going out to face Li, was unsure to what extent Venus's abject failure affected her own performance. "I just tried to stay focused," she said. She knew she had to be on her guard to avert the threat of another big upset. "She's good at making unbelievable shots," she said of Li. "And she serves really well." Serena now faces the unseeded Petra Kvitova, of the Czech Republic who prevailed against Kaia Kanepi, of Estonia. Kanepi squandered five match points as well as a 4-0 lead in the deciding set before succumbing 4-6, 7-6, 8-6. [e-mail]