Welcome to the Wimbledon briefing, where The Athletic will explain the stories behind the stories on each day of the tournament.
On day 11 of Wimbledon 2024, a women’s semifinal day for the ages, the challenge of being in control — and a dog in the Royal Box?
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A pair of women’s semifinals that made unlikely history
The women’s semifinals were still going on at after 7pm on Thursday, and the first of them, Jasmine Paolini against Donna Vekic, was the longest semifinal in Wimbledon history. It was the first time since 2004 that both had gone to three sets — which is a pretty extraordinary length of time for something that really shouldn’t be that unusual.
There are a few reasons for this. One is that there have been quite a few surprise semifinalists over the past few years, who appeared pretty overwhelmed by the time they got there. Elena Vesnina and Magdalena Rybarikova both won just two games in 2016 and 2017 against Serena Williams and Garbine Muguruza respectively; Lucie Safarova in 2014 and Kirsten Flipkens the year before had similar experiences. Williams herself is another big factor in all of this given she would routinely thump opponents in straight sets at this stage of the…
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