Maria and Serena make their way to the final four in Madrid

While our photographer Jimmie48 is on his way back home from the Spanish capital, preparing to charge his batteries for the upcoming Strasbourg tournament, I’m taking over the coverage of the Mutua Madrid Open, at this quarterfinal stage of the Premier-level tournament. The first to book her place in the semifinals on Thursday was defending champion Maria Sharapova, closely followed by world No.1 Serena Williams.

The third-seeded Sharapova snapped a two-match losing streak to seed No.5 Caroline Wozniacki, following up the tense victory over Caroline Garcia in the round of 16 with another three-setter in the quarterfinals. The Russian overcame the second-set dip and celebrated a 6-1 3-6 6-3 win over the Dane after two hours of play. Next for Masha is either her compatriot Svetlana Kuznetsova or seed No.13 Lucie Safarova.

Serena Williams is not thrilled with every shot she makes, as you can see in this pic, but overall she’s hardly ever troubled by her opponents, and the story was similar in Thursday’s quarterfinals, as the American found a safe way to the semis with a 6-1 6-3 victory over tenth-seeded Carla Suarez Navarro, without dropping serve throughout the encounter. The top-seeded Serena will next meet either fourth-seeded Petra Kvitova or Irina-Camelia Begu.

Amazingly, Serena is now on a 50-match winning streak at Premier Mandatory tournaments! Plus, she’s won her last 19 matches in Madrid and her last 27 matches in general. WOW! Serena is hitting so many milestones that soon we’ll have a headline: “Serena hits her 100th milestone.”