Two Williams sisters was too big a chunk for Sam Stosur to swallow. The Australian seed No.2 was solid and precise yesterday against Venus in the quarterfinals of Charleston, but the younger Williams was merciless, cutting today's semifinal short by a routine 6-1 6-1 victory in 59 minutes.

Maybe Stosur was exhausted from the two three-setters she played on Friday, but whatever the reason may be, the 2008 Charleston champion Serena held her serve throughout the match, hit 7 aces to Stosur's 3, 29 winners to Stosur's 7, while committing only 6 unforced errors more, 15 to 9.

Serena's opponent in the final will be the winner of the match between Polona Hercog and Lucie Safarova, which is currently in progress. (photo: © Neal Trousdale)

For the celebration of the 5th birthday of Women's Tennis Blog we organized a contest with a valuable glittery prize – a necklace with a tennis ball pendant adored by Swarovski crystals. The beautiful prize is a present of Emily Austin, a jewelery designer situated in Scottsdale, Arizona. Emily customizes jewelry and her selection includes more than 100 Swarovski colors. In addition, Emily has special collections dedicated to sports, such as tennis, yoga, football and golf.

Your task in the contest was to give correct answer to question "How many posts have been published on Women's Tennis Blog so far?". The correct answer was option No. 2, 2600-2800 posts. You could easily determine that by going to the bottom of the page, where by clicking "last" you could see that Women's Tennis Blog had 278 pages. Multiply that by ten posts per page and you get the correct answer. Also, you needed to find a friend to leave a comment on the Women's Tennis Fans page on Facebook explaining why you should win, preferably in a fun way. The winner selection process was random.

Now I have the pleasure of announcing the winner of the necklace *drumroll*:

LILLY LI!

Lilly Li correctly answered the question and her friend commented on Facebook: Lily Li should receive the necklace because almost everything that she owns has something to do with tennis : tennis-designed shorts, undergarments, bow, toothbrush, cup, bed sheets, blanket . . . She needs a necklace that is tennis related, of course

Congratulations, Lily Li!

I would like to thank all of you who participated in the contest. I hope that those of you who didn't win this time will have more luck in my future contests. Don't lose hope! Also, I would like to thank you for fun Facebook comments, especially Kartik for his song about Women's Tennis Blog:

WTB is 5, and it is cruising
And is celebrating with bling
Sounds like quite the thing

Plus, I been around since the beginning
And I seem to be the only one to do the right answering

Which is why I should be the one winning :-p

Cheers – mucho love,

Kartik

Thank you all once again for participating, and thank you, Emily, for providing me with the wonderful prize. I'm looking forward to new celebrations and contests on Women's Tennis Blog.

In all the four previous meetings of Venus Williams and Samantha Stosur, Williams was the winner in straight sets, while Stosur's maximum was to win four games in a set, which happened only on one occasion. Today in the quarterfinals of the Family Circle Cup, Stosur quickly equaled those four games in a set, and then straightforwardly won the opening set, before working her way to a 6-3 4-6 6-3 victory in two hours and 41 mintutes. Stosur's triumph means that there will be no all-Williams showdown in the semis.

The victory is even bigger for Stosur as she played another match today before the quarterfinal, another three-setter, against Galina Voskoboeva, which was continued from 4-2 15-0 in the first set. Stosur won 6-3 4-6 6-2 in two hours and two minutes.

Stosur pretty comfortably won the first set against Williams, by breaking the American in the sixth game, for 4-2, and not having any break points against herself in the entire set. Read more »

With her four-year deal with Sony Ericsson expired, Maria Sharapova has moved on to Samsung Electronics Co. and the agreement officially started on April 1, 2012. Over a period of three years, Sharapova will advertise Samsung products including mobile phones, tablet computers and television sets. The agreement covers Sharapova's native Russia and the Commonwealth of Independent States.

The list of the tennis star's sponsors currently features: Cole Haan, Evian, Head, Nike, Tiffany & Co., Tag Heuer, and now Samsung. (source: Maria Sharapova's official website, photo: © Neal Trousdale)

After a long break from tennis, Venus Williams claims not being used to winning in straight sets, but that’s exactly what she did against Jelena Jankovic in the second round of Charleston, and actually against three other players since her comeback at the recent tournament in Miami.

At 5-4 Jankovic was two points from taking the first set, but a double fault and a wide forehand assisted Williams to break her serve. Williams then won nine successive games to win 7-5 6-0 and make Jankovic the first of the six former champions in the draw to go out.

Exceptional movement and great sliding on clay, once the most beautiful parts of Jankovic's game, are not Jankovic's strong assets any more, while serve failed her as well and Williams broke her seven times.

Williams is playing her first claycourt tournament since 2010. Her quarterfinal opponent will be Anastasia Rodionova, who defeated Anabel Medina Garrigues 7-5 6-3. Venus could potentially face sister Serena in the semis. (sources: Women Who Serve, ESPN, photo: © Neal Trousdale)