Last year fashion was the topic of Wimbledon with Bethanie Mattek Sands' tennis-ball jacket and Venus Williams' awkward zipper-outfit, but this year tenniswear is in the safe zone, except for Serena Williams' color challenge. Let's have a closer look.

Serena Williams challenged the White Clothing Rule by pairing the Nike Women's London Statement Baseline Dress with cerise shorts/knickers and a matching headband, while Wimbledon requires the outfits to be without solid mass of coloring and little or no dark or bold colors. Nike was not pushing the boundaries with defending champion Petra Kvitova, who was traditionally wearing a sporty, ordinary outfit.

Maria Sharapova, the fresh proud owner of a career Grand Slam, is always fully-prepared for fashion scrutiny, thinking out her outfits in detail from head to toe with the Nike team. For the touch of color that the white Wimbledon allows, Sharapova chose liquid lime. Here you can see how the Nike Women's Maria Slam Statement Dress looks from the back.

My favorite of the tournament is Maria Kirilenko in the Adidas Adipure line. The white dress with a pleated skirt features craft emerald contrasting stripes. Read more »

Every Grand Slam is a unique opportunity for tennis fashion to step up and shine in the best light, so here at Women's Tennis Blog I always compile a collage of WTA photos to show the variety of styles in one place. For this French Open I played with movie making a bit and made this slideshow video. I hope you like it! Of course, don't forget to click the YouTube "Like" button if you do!

I included a lot of brands in the video, so that you get as comprehensive picture as possible. You can see players wearing Nike, Adidas,  Lotto, Reebok, Anta, Lacoste, Asics, Under Armour, EleVen, Fila and Adidas by Stella McCartney.

As you'll notice in the video, my pick for the best look of the 2012 French Open is Serena Williams, even though her display of the three-shade green Nike dress lasted for just one match (a long and exciting one, though). Also perfect was Ana Ivanovic and all the others who sported the Adidas Adizero style in lime and core energy.

Who's on your best-dressed list?

It's awesome being regular with these fashion overviews, so now we can easily refer to the past and compare. Check out Roland Garros designs in the past two years.

• 2011: Spring tennis fashion Roland Garros edition
• 2010: Roland Garros fashion radar – WTA outfits

Also, compare the claycourt looks with the styles sported on the blue courts in the Australian sun at Melbourne 2012.

It was the most anticipated match-up of the French Open second round and it ended in just 60 minutes without drama, without competition, twists and turns. Venus Williams walked out of the Court Philippe Chatrier after falling at the hands of world No.3 Agnieszka Radwanska 6-2 6-3.

Radwanska covered the court perfectly, her shots were varied and precise, and her unforced errors were down to a minimum (in the first set she committed just four, in the second just two). Venus, on the other hand, didn't bring in much resistance and only helped Radwanska with 33 unforced errors.

Only late in the second set, trailing 1-5, Venus held her serve, then broke Radwanska when she was serving for the match and earned a game point at 40-15 on her own serve. At that moment I had a glimmer of hope that this match would bring some excitement and Venus would just maybe come back, but it didn't happen. Radwanska earned a match point by a wonderful lob and capitalized when Venus sent a forehand long.

Venus' defeat came within just 24 hours after her sister Serena, the hottest favorite for the title, became the biggest news of the tournament by losing in the first round after a nerve-wrecking three-hour match. It was Serena's first ever exit in the first round of a Grand Slam, and she has played 47 first rounds.

Radwanska's opponent in the third round will be seed No.26 and 2009 Roland Garros champion Svetlana Kuznetsova, who defeated Yung-Jan Chan 6-4 7-6(4). (photo: © Neal Trousdale)

Defending champion Maria Sharapova is through to the semifinals of the Internazionali BNL d'Italia, beating wildcard Venus Williams 6-4 6-3 in the final eight. After a closely-fought first set, the Russian second seed broke Venus' serve for a 5-4 lead, and in the following game saved two break points before taking the set. The second set Sharapova started by establishing a 2-0 lead, and even though Venus leveled at 2-all, the American didn't give much more resistance. Besides confidently holding one more service game, the rest of the set was Sharapova's and Venus even ended the match with a double fault. Sharapova's semifinal opponent will be Petra Kvitova or Angelique Kerber.

Earlier in the quarterfinals, Serena Williams was on court for just 28 minutes, as Flavia Pennetta retired with a right wrist injury while trailing 4-0. Williams' claycourt winning streak has mounted to 17 matches, and the American, who has this spring won on the green clay of Charleston and the blue clay of Madrid, confidently stated: "I've played on ice and on water. I can play on any surface."

Serena's opponent in the semifinals will be French Open champion Li Na of China, who stormed to a 6-1 4-0 lead against Dominika Cibulkova, before the Slovak recovered to take the second set to a tiebreak. Still, Li won 6-1 7-6 (4) and is now looking for her second victory over Serena in their seventh meeting. (photo courtesy of Francesca Moscatelli)

At the Mutua Madrid Open, Angelique Kerber is among those enjoying the new blue clay in the tennis world, especially now after taking out seven-time Grand Slam champion Venus Williams 6-4 6-1 in the second round, who as a wildcard competed in her third tournament since coming back after the diagnosis of Sjögren's syndrome.

The 12th-seeded Kerber does find the blue clay specific, but overall not in a bad way:

It doesn't matter to me where I play – blue clay, red clay, hardcourts. The blue clay is a little bit different though. It's very slippery and the balls bounce a little bit higher, but I feel good on it, and I'm in the third round now. I hope to continue like this.

Kerber recorded her first victory over Venus, who reached the quarterfinals of Miami and Charleston, the other two tournaments she played since the comeback.

In the first round of Madrid, Venus had a tough victory over Simona Halep, 6-1 4-6 7-6(6), while Kerber defeated Johanna Larsson 6-1 6-4. Kerber's next opponent will be eighth seed Li Na, who beat Spanish wildcard Silvia Soler-Espinosa, 6-3 6-1. (photo: Ralf Reinecke)