Riske is definitely both ‘half decent’ and in form. She had a fantastic grass season coming into W and is no Tier 3 player on her favorite surface.
If we want to talk fluke draws, Svitolina stumbled into the semi and was absolutely exposed by Simona today. She wouldn’t have survived Riske in a million years.
In fact, the only semifinalist who had to make it through a tough draw was Barbora.
IMO Riske is not the kind of player to take out Serena no matter how "in form" she appears to be against lesser players.... It would take more than that even against this version of Serena. I'm thinking more like Barty, Bencic, Kerber (not in form but she can raise to the occasion), Kvitova, Bartens or even Konta and Stephens which were in her half. Or at least Martens, Siniakova, Anisimova who did some damage in the recent past against top players.
Gorges, CSN, Strycova were weak matchups for Serena. Sure, I had some hopes from Gorges to give her a run for the money and eventually take her out earlier in the tournament but that did not happen. She's not the same player that made the Wimbledon SF and entered the top 10 last year.
It's absolutely no ones fault that she went to the final unchallenged, much less Serena's. She did what she was supposed to do - win every match against whomever was on the other side of the net. This is how it works for everyone absolutely.
Just pointing the fact that she had a tone of luck with that. It's almost like someone up there paved the way for her to get the #24. More so having to play against Halep who is not exactly the most composed and successful top player in the big moments and I'm sure she still has a mental block with Serena.
The writing is on the wall - Serena #24 and the victory of the motherhood!