2019 Wimbledon WTA Semifinals Betting Odds, Preview: Will Serena Williams Coast to the Final?

We are firmly in the business portion of the 2019 Wimbledon Championships. The ladies' semifinals will take place on Thursday, though start time and order of play are still TBD at the time of publication.

This year's final four features a pair of Grand Slam Champions, Serena Williams and Simona Halep, facing off against two women in their first ever semifinal at a slam, Barbora Strycova and Elina Svitolina.

Let's take a look at the betting picture for Thursday's action at the All England Club:

Serena Williams (-360) vs Barbora Strycova (+300)

• Spread: Serena Williams -4.5 games (-120)
• Over/Under: 20.5 games
• Head-to-head: Serena Williams 3-0

Serena Williams is into her 12th Wimbledon semifinal. This is an incredible accomplishment even for the GOAT of women’s tennis.

Despite being in the “Quarter of Death,” Serena received a pretty easy path to the semifinals. She was tested by Alison Riske on Tuesday but she played her best tennis of 2019 in the third set to get into the final four. She hit eight aces, 20 winners, and only nine unforced errors in the decider.

Serena was -370 against Riske, and I think an argument can be made that the Pittsburgh native will be Serena's toughest competition all tournament.

Barbora Strycova is currently on the best run of her career and will be playing in a Grand Slam semifinal for the first time. Grass is Strycova's best surface, but she just played the best match of her life against Jo Konta in the quarterfinals and will need to bring that same level — if not better — against the GOAT.

Strycova was able to put the aggressive Konta in precarious positions throughout the match and closed out points well. The biggest factor in the win, though, was Strycova's serve — specifically her second serve. The 33-year-old  won 74% of her second-serve points.

That’s only happened one other time this year and is not a recipe for success against Serena, who is 3-0 against Strycova, with one of those victories coming on grass, though it should be noted that Strycova was competitive in two of those matches before bowing out.

Serena opened as a -385 favorite but that number has dipped slightly. I actually make the American a -420 favorite in this match and, even though I don't think there's enough value to lay that juice, I would lean towards backing Serena in straight sets at -130.

I'm just not sure Strycova can gain an advantage early enough in points to do damage. Konta only won 2-of-19 second-serve points (not including double faults) against Strycova. Serena will do much better than that.

Simona Halep (-220) vs Elina Svitolina (+180)

• Spread: Simona Halep -3.5 games (-115)
• Over/Under: 21.5 games
• Head-to-head: Tied 4-4

Up to this point, Elina Svitolina was known as the best player on the WTA Tour without an appearance in a Grand Slam semifinal. It's certainly surprising that her maiden trip to a final four at a major came at the 2019 Wimbledon Championships because she's struggled all year with fitness and form and grass has been her worst surface to this point in her career.

Tennis doesn't make sense sometimes.

Svitolina has benefited from a relatively weak draw and has had some injury luck, as well. She was on the brink of losing to Margarita Gasparyan in Round 2 before Gasparyan fell and injured her leg, forcing her to retire from the match.

Svitolina also got by Petra Martic — one of the most in-form players coming into the tournament — after Martic hurt herself in the first set.

Despite the luck, Svitolina has shown moments of very good tennis on the lawn. She's been very aggressive and that's been the key to her run at the All England Club.

Although Svitolina was a little shaky closing out Karolina Muchova in the quarterfinals, she was still impressive. The 24-year-old Ukrainian hit 24 winners compared to 16 unforced errors.

Simona Halep, on the other hand, struggled in the early stages of her quarterfinal match against Shuai Zhang. The Romanian was still able to force a tiebreak in the opening set, though, and she took over from there.

Like Svitolina, grass is typically Halep's worst surface. That being said, she's looked stellar at Wimbledon having only dropped one set. She's never looked to be in real danger of losing a match thus far. The slower-than-normal Wimbledon courts seemed to have helped Halep.

These two stars have split their eight meetings but this is the first time they will battle on the lawn. They have played some big matches — including the 2017 French Open quarterfinals — but this will be their biggest tilt to date.

The odds for this match have moved in Halep's direction slightly. The Romanian opened at -210 and has since drifted to -220.

I think this match is closer than that and have the line at Halep -195. Once again, I don't think there's enough value to hop on Svitolina on the moneyline, but will be backing her +3.5 games.

I still have reservations about Svitolina keeping it together in big moments, but I think she can take a set 6-2 or 6-1 given her form and aggressiveness.