Comeback girls reign at 'a very weird grand slam'

There is no grand slam winner left in the ladies' singles, but Lisicki, the world No.24, defies her ranking on grass and her comprehensive 6-3, 6-3 defeat of Estonia's Kaia Kanepi set up a semi-final match with Agnieszka Radwanska, the Polish fourth seed and the highest-ranked woman in the tournament.

The big-serving German is focused on gilding the most extraordinary of comebacks with the Venus Rosewater Dish, awarded to the women's champion. The 23-year-old spoke bluntly yesterday of how grateful she feels at the extent of her recovery from an ankle injury sustained in 2010.

"Three years ago I had to learn how to walk again and that has made me appreciate every single moment out there a lot more," Lisicki said. "Once you have to learn how to walk again, it just shows you how we actually have to appreciate to have two healthy legs.

"Being on crutches, you can't carry anything. You need the help of somebody else. So just being able to walk again and carry my own stuff was great. And then to come back on the court to compete and then to go even further than I did before the injury gives you a lot of strength."

Lisicki's philosophy now differs from the other three semi-finalists – Radwanska, Marion Bartoli and Kirsten Flipkens – in that she believes she has already achieved, though it will not stop her making a sustained tilt at the title.

There was never any danger of her succumbing to the curse of the shockmaker. Steve Darcis, Sergiy Stakhovsky and Michelle Larcher De Brito, the respective conquerors of Rafael Nadal, Roger Federer and Maria Sharapova last week, had all failed to make the next round, Darcis pulling out through injury. But Lisicki avoided the same fate with another commanding display.

She will face Radwanska, who struggled with a thigh injury on Centre Court, finally overcoming Li Na 7-6 (5), 4-6, 6-2. Radwanska, runner-up last year, saved four set points in the opening set and she also had to contend with thigh problems during the match.

"I really have had two tough matches in the past week," said the 24-year-old Pole. "Too much tennis the last few days, always struggling with that – but it's a good problem to have, and I just have to keep going.

"Lisicki? We know each other since the juniors, and I am really looking forward to playing her on grass."

The other semi-final will be contested between Bartoli and Flipkens. The latter defeated Petra Kvitova 4-6, 6-3, 6-4 to reach a grand slam semi-final for the first time in her career. Kvitova, who won the Wimbledon title in 2011, said later she was suffering from a virus and the health report was extended to her conqueror. Flipkens suffered from blood clots last year and dropped far down the rankings, but the 27-year-old Belgian has now reached her first grand slam semi-final.

Now ranked No.20, she said: "I still don't really realise what I've managed to go through today and what I've achieved today. Last year, I didn't get into the qualifying of Wimbledon. I was ranked 262. Today, I'm a semi-finalist in a grand slam."

Flipkens, who won the quarter-final on her mother Carly's birthday, added: "It's a dream – more than a dream – come true. There's no words."

The curse of Serena extended to another day. After the world No.1 was dethroned, she picked Sloane Stephens, her 19-year-old countrywoman, as a likely winner. However, the world No.17 was defeated by Bartoli almost exclusively because of a defective serve. The Frenchwoman won the match 6-4, 7-5 in a match littered with dropped serves. There were nine service games lost in the second set, but Bartoli finally held to win a match interrupted for more than two hours by rain.

The semi-final line-up is now completed and cases could be made for all four contenders, though the Lisicki-Radwanska clash is surely the more likely to produce the champion. But, then again, as Kvitova reflected last night: "It's a very weird grand slam."