Wimbledon Tennis Tournament

Saturday morning, on the pockmarked grass at Wimbledon's center court, two sisters from Compton will trade booming serves and bolo-punch forehands for the All England title. When the last ball is struck and Venus and Serena Williams embrace at net, they will have finished facing off in a Grand Slam final for the seventh time, the third time on British soil. This is a supremely consistent duo: A Williams sister has played in the Wimbledon women's singles final every year this century but one.

If you cupped your ear toward Atlanta in the wee hours this morning, you almost might've heard some exuberance and maybe even some hollering. That rare entity known as the 7 a.m. party would have commenced. The kitchen staff of a tennis club in Norcross, Ga., would have arrived. And if it resembled Saturday, a throng might have yelled toward a big screen even if they couldn't see anything up there but a mostly static web page.

Pete vs. Andre just wasn't happening a couple of years ago due to a lack of Andre Agassi. So, things were getting rather dull in men's tennis and, well, if Patrick Rafter was willing to take shots at Pete Sampras, the media was willing to make the most of it. The feud, if you can call it that, lacked the bite of John McEnroe vs. Jimmy Connors. But Rafter and Sampras--who play in today's men's final at Wimbledon--had a long stretch of tension, starting in 1997 and running through 1999.

WIMBLEDON, England -- A peculiar, obscure tennis match from Tuesday, June 25, 2002, has breathed on ever since with a relevance few in its Centre Court audience would've forecast. On that afternoon, the defending Wimbledon champion remained Goran Ivanisevic of Croatia. Pete Sampras lingered one day from his last Wimbledon match, an incomprehensible loss to 145th-ranked George Bastl. And an 18-year-old qualifier from Croatia, Mario Ancic, ranked No. 154, played his first Grand Slam match.

Top-seeded Monica Seles has withdrawn from next week's Wimbledon tennis tournament after a minor accident, losing her chance to win tennis' Grand Slam, tournament officials said Friday. No information was available on the accident. "It is a complete mystery," Wimbledon referee Alan Mills said after getting the news only hours before a meeting to arrange the first day's order of play. "It came as a great surprise to me."

It just keeps raining and raining and raining, so the London newspapers don't know what to do. With no Wimbledon tennis to report, all they can do is keep creating bogus scandals: UFO Refuses to Release Monica Seles Aliens, not ailments, have turned out to be responsible for Monica Seles' sudden withdrawal from the Wimbledon tennis tournament, the London Daily Slime has learned. "It's that new haircut," one alien reportedly said. "We assumed she was one of us." The women's No.

The total purse for this summer's Wimbledon tennis tournament was raised 23% Wednesday, to $6.4 million from $5.2 million. The winner of the men's singles title at the end of the June 25-July 8 event will earn $379,500. The women's champion will receive $341,550.

John McEnroe's name appears on a list of entries for this year's Wimbledon tennis tournament, three years after the volatile American made his last appearance. Wimbledon referee Alan Mills confirmed McEnroe's appearance on the list of provisional entries and said the tournament would welcome him back.

As sometimes happens here in the Wimbledon tennis tournament, a woman's underwear became somewhat more interesting than her game Friday. How else to account for the men hanging in the cherry trees along Somerset Road. "Quiet in the trees," the umpire on Court 6 kept demanding. How else, for that matter, to account for the cluster of photographers, the clatter of their high-speed cameras perhaps more bothersome than even the young men. It was Barbara Potter, this time.

Ken Flach and Wendy Turnbull received wild-card berths in the singles competition of this year's Wimbledon tennis tournament.

TODAY'S FEATURED MATCHES Men's semifinals. World rankings in parentheses. Andy Roddick (6) vs. Andy Murray (3), Britain (Murray leads head to head, 6-2, and 1-0 in Grand Slams.) Europeans long have noted that American tourists are loud and annoying. Well, here's one case in which an American tourist will note that Europeans are loud and annoying. Roger Federer (2), Switzerland, vs. Tommy Haas (34), Germany (Federer leads head to head, 9-2, and 3-0 in Grand Slams.

Nine bustling years ago, after an awkward Wimbledon semifinal, two under-21 sisters met at the Centre Court net and the winner, Venus Williams, put her arm around the loser and said, "Let's go, Serena. Let's get out of here."

Had you attended the top American male tennis player's melancholy post-loss news conferences at the last three Wimbledons, you might have wound up needing a pep talk, an ice cream cone or maybe even a hug. Had you listened to him on Wednesday night at Wimbledon, you might have wound up chortling, giggling or maybe even laughing.

TODAY'S FEATURED MATCHES Women's semifinals; world rankings in parentheses: Venus Williams (3) vs. Dinara Safina (1), Russia Williams has played a brand of grass-court tennis so superb there have been moments when the stadium speakers ought to have played Mozart. Safina has conducted trademark raging battles with herself such that there've been moments when the stadium speakers ought to have played AC/DC. (Williams leads head to head, 2-1, with no previous Grand Slam meetings.

In a women's game supposedly savaged by anarchy, ailing as a hard-to-market hodgepodge with the No. 1 ranking passed around like a relay baton since Justine Henin retired in May 2008, well, look here. Somehow, after the ruthless process of a Grand Slam with all the masses who can blast tennis balls and grunt like wounded hyenas and beat the stuffing out of most everybody, Wimbledon has churned out semifinalists with seedings Nos. 1, 2, 3 and 4. Why, it's a pillar of form.

TODAY'S FEATURED MATCHES Men's quarterfinals; world rankings in parentheses: Andy Roddick (6) vs. Lleyton Hewitt (56), Australia Awww, remember long ago when they were up-and-comers and they played that raucous nighttime 2001 U.S. Open quarterfinal and Hewitt won and Roddick lost his mind after that overrule of a line call in the fifth set?

A fresh star blasted in Monday at Wimbledon, all gaudy and outsized and extravagant like most stars but with the quirk that this one happens to be inanimate. The new Centre Court roof unfolded itself for its first real performance on Monday evening and within six bold and brassy hours already basically had harrumphed that it plans to spend the 21st century as a major player throwing its considerable weight around the Championships.

World rankings in parentheses: Venus Williams (3) vs. Ana Ivanovic (12), Serbia In advance of this starry matchup between former No. 1s, Williams has won an astounding 29 consecutive sets at Wimbledon dating to 2007. This has presented a major problem to opponents as time has proved it's very hard to beat the other player if you cannot win any sets. -- Serena Williams (2) vs. Daniela Hantuchova (32), Slovakia As she passed career Grand Slam match No.

If you cupped your ear toward Atlanta in the wee hours this morning, you almost might've heard some exuberance and maybe even some hollering. That rare entity known as the 7 a.m. party would have commenced. The kitchen staff of a tennis club in Norcross, Ga., would have arrived. And if it resembled Saturday, a throng might have yelled toward a big screen even if they couldn't see anything up there but a mostly static web page.

Talk of the dilapidation of American tennis has droned on for so long that it's stale; talk of the dilapidation of Australian tennis has revved up long enough that it's audible; and talk of the dilapidation of British tennis has blared roughly since dinosaurs roamed the earth. Meanwhile, just look at the wake of the defending champion Rafael Nadal, even after he withdrew from this Wimbledon and took his muscles to Mallorca: six male Spaniards (plus two females) in the final 32.