Kerber, Lisicki, Cibulkova bring fourth-round fire with epic battles

Welcome to Wimbledon Rewind, where wtatennis.com will take a look back at some of the most memorable matches from the past two decades at the All England Club. From notorious upsets, statement victories to great escapes, rewind the clock and check out our list of the Top 8 fourth-round matches, laid out in chronological order. 

Wimbledon Round Reviews
Gauff ascends, Serena survives through first round thrillers
Venus, Navratilova, Date turn back the clock in second round classics
Serena survives Watson, Kvitova conquers Venus in first-week finishes

1999: [6] Venus Williams def. [17] Anna Kournikova 3-6, 6-3, 6-2
By the time Venus Williams and Anna Kournikova met for the third time, both were still teenagers - but two years had passed since their dazzling coming-out WTA seasons in 1997, and the pressure to join Martina Hingis as a Grand Slam champion had only grown. Williams had established herself as a Top 5 mainstay, at least: the American arrived in Wimbledon with four titles and a 30-5 record under her belt in 1999. Questions lingered, though, about her ability to peak in majors: she had been shut out 6-4, 6-0 by Lindsay Davenport in the Australian Open quarterfinals and squandered three match points against qualifier Barbara Schwartz in the Roland Garros fourth round.

Kournikova's struggles had been even more pronounced: returning from a thumb injury, the end of 1998 and start of 1999 had been marked by dramatic service yips and double faults, which had hit a nadir at the Australian Open. But the Russian had quietly begun to stabilize, and came into The Championships fresh off a solid Eastbourne semifinal run.

The quality of Kournikova's game had been evident in tight first- and second-round wins over dangerous opposition, Schwartz and Maria Vento-Kabchi, and the 18-year-old displayed similarly dazzling form out of the blocks against Williams. A feast of accurate baseline hitting, swatted return winners and a plethora of dropshots saw Kournikova leap out to a 4-0 lead, and such was her confidence that she casually closed the set out by serving and volleying.

Gallery: Venus Williams: 40 great moments

But canny tactical adjustments and resilient counterpunching would turn the match around for Williams. Swarming the net whenever she was able put the 19-year-old in control of more points; and when Kournikova's flat hitting had her on the run, Williams soaked up the pace and refused to let the ball past her. As the Kournikova forehand began to falter, Williams went from strength to strength, eventually sealing victory with a high backhand volley. One round later, she would fall to No.2 seed Stefanie Graf in a quarterfinal classic; one year later, she would become champion herself to begin her own legendary Wimbledon reign. And in five further meetings, Williams would not drop another set to Kournikova.

2005: [9] Anastasia Myskina def. [6] Elena Dementieva 1-6, 7-6(9), 7-5
In 2005, Anastasia Myskina arrived at Wimbledon in disarray - but over the course of a wild first week, the previous year's Roland Garros champion got her groove back.

A month earlier the Russian, whose mother Galina had been diagnosed with cancer and who had been battling a shoulder injury of her own, had become the first defending champion in the Open Era to crash out of Roland Garros in the first round, losing 6-4, 4-6, 6-0 to World No.109 María Sánchez Lorenzo. In SW19, she had narrowly escaped the same fate against World No.146 Katerina Bohmova, overturning deficits of 1-4 in the second set and 0-3 in the third to survive 5-7, 7-6(4), 6-4; two rounds later, a gripping third round saw her squander two match points up 5-3 in the second set but roar back from 1-5 down in the third to triumph over No.17 seed Jelena Jankovic 6-0, 5-7, 10-8.

Read more: Myskina makes history and ushers in Russian dynasty

It seemed that Myskina's luck had run out against Elena Dementieva in the fourth round. Myskina had taken an iron grip of their rivalry after routing her friend and compatriot in the 2004 Roland Garros final, winning all three of their clashes that year in straight sets, but after committing 19 unforced errors to just one winner in the first set, rapidly fell behind 1-6, 0-3.

But by this point unlikely comebacks were second nature to a battle-hardened Myskina. Within the overall rollercoaster of the match were a plethora of mini-rollercoasters - epic games, sequences of breaks and re-breaks - but the 23-year-old rode them all with aplomb, striking 22 winners across the final two sets. An edge-of-seat second-set tiebreak saw her fend off two match points - and although a resilient Dementieva proved difficult to shake off in the deciding set, Myskina sealed victory with a final plot twist, maybe the most unexpected of the day: a love hold.

2008: [14] Agnieszka Radwanska def. [4] Svetlana Kuznetsova 6-4, 1-6, 7-5
Just two years after reaching the fourth round of Wimbledon as a wildcard ranked World No.217 on her Grand Slam debut, a 19-year-old Agnieszka Radwanska arrived at The Championships in 2008 as a seed for the first time. The Pole's ascent up the rankings had been smooth and rapid, and had hit another important milestone the previous week with the Eastbourne title - Radwanska's third trophy that year, and first at Tier II level, sealed in a classic final over Nadia Petrova.

The beguiling variety and superlative finesse in the teenager's game was already garnering her a reputation as a fan favorite - particularly, given her affinity for grass, at Wimbledon, where she would go on to reach the final in 2012. Increasingly, too, Radwanska was becoming known as an upset artist, capable of defusing the power of those at the top of the game on the big stage. Her first two Top 5 wins both came at different Grand Slams - Maria Sharapova at the 2007 US Open and Svetlana Kuznetsova at the 2008 Australian Open - and this repeat of the Kuznetsova victory added a third to the list as she forged her way into a first Wimbledon quarterfinal.

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In Melbourne, Radwanska had efficiently shut down Kuznetsova 6-3, 6-4. But the Russian had avenged that loss in Indian Wells and, fresh off the Roland Garros semifinals, was in excellent form. Though the teenager was able to sneak the first set, Kuznetsova upped the ante to reel off 10 of the next 12 games to take a 4-1 lead in the decider.

Indeed, Kuznetsova would end the match with superior numbers in almost every category: 60 winners to Radwanska's 20, 15 aces to Radwanska's one, a higher percentage of both first and second serve points won and, overall, 104 points to 96. But it was the cool-headed youngster who was able to bring her best tennis to bear on the biggest points, brushing off being overpowered in the middle of the match to disrupt her more powerful opponent at its climax.

Curiously, though Radwanska would have Kuznetsova's number in 2008, winning three of their four meetings, it was not a pattern that held over the course of their careers: following that season, Kuznetsova won 10 of their 11 encounters to end their rivalry with a dominant 14-4 record.

2010: [1] Serena Williams def. [16] Maria Sharapova 7-6(9), 6-4
Strange as it may seem now, at one point Serena Williams's clashes with Maria Sharapova resembled a competitive rivalry - but this was arguably the last of those points.

Coming into Wimbledon 2010, Williams had taken four wins in a row against Sharapova, led the overall head-to-head 5-2, and had not lost to the Russian in five-and-a-half years. Yet two of those last four had been three-setters, including their most recent encounter at Charleston 2008. Both players had endured a somewhat turbulent half-decade, with moments of glory interspersed with health and other struggles; indeed, each had already missed several months of 2010 due to elbow injuries, though Williams had still managed to lift her 12th Grand Slam trophy at the Australian Open, while Sharapova had picked up titles in Memphis and Strasbourg, and was fresh off a run to the Birmingham final (where she fell to Li Na). Their first meeting at Wimbledon since Sharapova's star-making victory in the 2004 final was far from a foregone conclusion.

Defending champion Williams had been in fearsome form over the course of the first week, conceding just 10 games in three matches against Michelle Larcher De Brito, Anna Chakvetadze and Dominika Cibulkova, dishing out a bagel in each. The American hit the ground running, serving up four aces in her opening game - of 19 in total - and, moving sharply to track down lobs and dropshots, breaking to go up 3-1.

But two missed backhands beckoned Sharapova into the match, and the 23-year-old needed no further encouragement to turn it into a ferocious contest. The tension throughout the remainder of the set was palpable as each refused to give ground on serve; indeed, as it reached its climax, it was Williams clinging on, needing to escape from 30-30 situations at 4-4 and 5-5 (finding consecutive aces for the former). In a knife-edge tiebreak, Sharapova was unable to take three set points - before an untimely fifth double fault at 9-9 sealed her fate. As if to rub salt in the wound, Williams slammed down yet another ace to take her own third set point.

Two more double faults from Sharapova enabled Williams to move up an early break in the second set, and from there the result was rarely in doubt as the 28-year-old's own delivery remained impregnable. It would have been small comfort to Sharapova that this ended up the World No.1's toughest match en route to her 13th major title - particularly given the spell of dominance it sparked for Williams in their head-to-head. Williams would drop just nine games to Sharapova in their next three matches, and in their 14 encounters since has conceded only one set. This was the last time Sharapova was a threat to Williams on court; it wasn't enough, and the ensuing decade simply saw the older player put increasing distance between them.

2011: [24] Dominika Cibulkova def. [1] Caroline Wozniacki 1-6, 7-6(5), 7-5
Between October 2010 and January 2012, Caroline Wozniacki spent 67 out of 68 weeks at the top of the rankings. But although the Dane lifted six WTA trophies during this period, she was unable to translate that form to the Grand Slam stage, with her futility being most pronounced at Wimbledon - where Wozniacki would never reach the quarterfinals, falling in the fourth round on six occasions.

The third of those was in 2011 when, having fallen in the third round of Roland Garros to Daniela Hantuchova, Wozniacki opted to warm up for Wimbledon on the indoor hard courts of her home tournament in Copenhagen. Not that this seemed to be to her detriment: the 20-year-old had taken the title and swept into the last 16 at SW19 without dropping a set - and though she had been defeated by Dominika Cibulkova in Sydney that year, overall she carried a 6-2 head-to-head lead over the Slovak into this clash.

Cibulkova was battle-hardened, though, having beaten Simona Halep and Svetlana Kuznetsova en route to the 's-Hertogenbosch semifinals the previous week; she had also barely escaped Mirjana Lucic-Baroni in the first round, overturning a 3-6, 1-3 deficit before triumphing 3-6, 6-3, 8-6. The 21-year-old would essay another remarkable comeback to reel Wozniacki in, clinging on to the second set by her fingertips and fending off a point to fall behind 0-3 in the decider.

Read more: WTA Exit Interview: Cibulkova pens new chapter with retirement announcement, new memoir

Throughout, Cibulkova would demonstrate the value of one of the most radical stylistic reinventions of the century. Having emerged on to the tour as a counterpuncher, a game that took her into the Top 20 as a teenager, under the tutelage of coach Zeljko Krajan she had developed into an all-out aggressive baseliner, capable of generating serious power despite her comparative lack of height - and confident enough to commit to these lower percentages. Cibulkova would strike 44 winners to 33 unforced errors in this match - and her greater risk-taking paid off against Wozniacki's 33 winners and 16 unforced errors as she forged her way into her first of three Wimbledon quarterfinals.

Five years later, Cibulkova would reprise the quality she showed here to win another classic last-16 encounter, a 6-3, 5-7, 9-7 triumph over Agnieszka Radwanska featuring stellar shotmaking from both.

2013: [23] Sabine Lisicki def. [1] Serena Williams 6-2, 1-6, 6-4
One of the most remarkable streaks in recent Wimbledon history is Sabine Lisicki's reliability as the scourge of Roland Garros champions. Six have fallen victim to the German to date at SW19, four of whom were fresh off their Parisian crowns - and the last of those was arguably the finest as Lisicki came through a pulsating encounter to end the longest winning streak of Serena Williams's career.

Having defeated Svetlana Kuznetsova in 2009, Li Na in 2011 and Maria Sharapova in 2012, as well as 2010 French Open champion Francesca Schiavone in the 2013 first round, the threat Lisicki's booming grass game posed to players coming off a clay high was a known quantity. But Williams was in some of the best sustained form of her career, even by her lofty standards: the defending champion held three of the four Grand Slam titles and was riding a 34-match winning streak dating back to March.

Lisicki, though, was aware of her streak, saying afterwards that her record against Roland Garros champions was a "good omen" for her, and gave her "a little more energy". That was evident as she raced away with the first set: a sequence of marathon opening games had set the stage for a tight contest, but Lisicki raised her level to reel off the last four in rapid fashion, sealing the set with a clean forehand return winner for a love break.

Gallery: Artists of the upset: First-week shocks at Wimbledon since 1999

Williams wasted little time in turning the tables, at one point rattling off 14 straight points as she marched through a one-sided second set - and as she took a 3-0 lead in the decider with a streak of nine games, seemed firmly in control.

But the beauty of tennis's scoring system is how abruptly momentum can be reversed: bad luck on a net cord prevented Williams from taking a 4-1 lead, and suddenly tension crept back into her game while Lisicki, sensing opportunity, began gleefully striking out again. Though both players had dominated behind their serves at various points, the gripping dénouement would feature four breaks in the last six games as Lisicki mounted an extraordinary comeback, taking her second match point by powering through a forehand putaway after a gloriously athletic rally.

The 23-year-old would ride her victory all the way to her maiden Grand Slam final - winning another classic encounter in the semifinals against Agnieszka Radwanska - but for Williams, the result was a mere blip. The American would lose only one more match in 2013, adding a 17th Grand Slam title at the US Open as well as her fourth WTA Finals trophy in Istanbul to round off one of the finest seasons of her career - a context which burnishes Lisicki's feat even more.

2014: [9] Angelique Kerber def. [5] Maria Sharapova 7-6(4), 4-6, 6-4
By 2014, Angelique Kerber had quietly become one of the WTA's MVPs in terms of delivering epic matches. The German had been embroiled in thrilling encounters against the game's elite on a frequent basis for several years at this point - but, without a Grand Slam quarterfinal showing since 2012 nor a Top 10 win at a major to her name, seemed stuck just outside that group of players herself.

All that would change as the late bloomer ultimately transformed herself into a three-time Grand Slam champion, and this victory, the first time she would triumph over a Top 10 player at a Slam, was arguably a key step in her journey. Kerber had lost four of her five previous encounters against Maria Sharapova, who was fresh off her fifth and final major title at Roland Garros. The Russian had eviscerated her first-week opponents at Wimbledon, dropping only seven games en route to the last 16, while Kerber had been stretched to three sets by both Heather Watson and Kirsten Flipkens.

Gallery: Serving notice: First Grand Slam titles at Wimbledon in the Open Era

Yet over a scintillating two hours and 37 minutes, Kerber matched and even exceeded one of the grittiest competitors in the sport for sheer determination, while the quality of her counterpunching should have left few in doubt that she had the game to reach the summit herself. Throughout, the 26-year-old was the player consistently keeping her nose in front, with her signature forehand down the line particularly on song - but at almost every juncture, Kerber had to display serious resilience to hold off the permanent threat of a Sharapova comeback.

The first and third sets exemplified this: in both, Kerber shot out of the blocks to claim an early break, only to falter when it came to serving out the set. Nonetheless, despite being faced with a surging Sharapova, it was Kerber who displayed the tenacity required to snatch the first-set tiebreak and then, in an appropriately knife-edge climax to the contest, break the Russian to take victory on her seventh match point.

Though Kerber would run out of gas against Eugenie Bouchard in the quarterfinals the following day, few who watched this match would have been surprised to see her in the Wimbledon final in two years' time - nor holding the Venus Rosewater Dish aloft for the first time four years later.

2019: Alison Riske def. [1] Ashleigh Barty 3-6, 6-2, 6-3
Early in her career, Alison Riske gained a reputation as a rather extreme grass-court specialist. The American's first 13 WTA main draw wins all came on the surface between 2010 and 2013, and only after several years of emerging as a dangerous floater on the lawns was she able to make her flat-hitting game work in the same way across other surfaces and break the Top 100 as a result.

Indeed, by 2019 Riske had largely shed the idea that she was a surface specialist - but her affinity for the turf would shine brightest in an extraordinarily dramatic few weeks this year. On a six-match losing streak and ranked World No.62 at the start of June, Riske would bounce back by winning 14 out of 16 grass-court matches, lifting her second WTA trophy in 's-Hertogenbosch along the way. Eleven of those contests were three-setters (nine of which she won), including the last eight - all five of her Wimbledon matches as the 29-year-old battled her way into her maiden Grand Slam quarterfinal.

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After surviving No.22 seed Donna Vekic 3-6, 6-3, 7-5, Ivana Jorovic 6-2, 6-7(3), 9-7 and No.13 seed Belinda Bencic 4-6, 6-4, 6-4, Riske was battle-hardened ahead of her toughest test on paper: freshly-crowned Roland Garros champion and brand new World No.1 Ashleigh Barty, who had backed up her maiden Grand Slam trophy by taking the Birmingham title and extending her winning streak to 15. Grass was the Australian's preferred surface, after all, as she ably demonstrated as she served and sliced her way to her 17th straight set in just over half an hour.

But as the match went on, Riske warmed to her task - and heated up her serve. Broken twice in the first set, she would not drop serve again in the match, and would face only one break point over the next two sets. Meanwhile, her flat power was increasingly proving too much for Barty to consistently handle off the ground. As the top seed's service statistics began to plummet, Riske took full advantage as she sealed her third career Top 5 win, and first at a Grand Slam. Nor did she let up off grass, instead riding her momentum all the way to a maiden year-end Top 20 finish.