Rarely can winner and loser have looked so removed from their result as did the five-times champion Venus Williams, who moves on to her ninth Wimbledon final on Saturday as if weighed down by the debt of a small country, and Johanna Konta, who left the tournament with a megawatt smile and upbeat hopes for the future.

The 37-year-old American, who took just under an hour and a quarter to win an often disappointing contest 6-4, 6-2, is the oldest finalist here since Martina Navratilova in 1994, yet spoke so softly afterwards and gave so little away, she might have been talking in another language.

The room craned forward when she was asked why this was her chosen method, and she whispered: “I’m definitely in the position I want to be in. It’s a long two weeks. Now I’m knocking on the door for a title. This is where I want to be. I’m definitely excited. But there’s still more to happen. I’m still very focused.”

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And it sort of made sense. The stress of modern professional sport is so great that athletes have learned to embrace success and failure with barely discernible shifts in emotion. It keeps them grounded, lowers expectations, helps them handle the inevitable fall. This, then, is The Process. This is how they ride the rollercoaster. Yet it is frustrating to those not privy to their real emotions, because it is impossible to tell how much of what they say they mean.

Williams has done one stage turn for years, a twirl and wave to the crowd to acknowledge victory. But fists remain unpumped. Speeches are short, predictable and hardly ever controversial.

Konta, who should have won the first set but for a Williams second-serve ace that saved the second break point against her in the ninth game, at least could be heard, and she was very much in what Heather Watson used to call Happy Land, a place of unconfined joy and optimism.

Told there were fans on the hill outside wearing T-shirts bearing her name, she gasped and replied to communal laughter: “Konta mania, I didn’t hear that before! It’s just incredibly humbling. It’s something that is greater than me and my focus on my match and my performance, and trying to improve. It does bring it slightly out of context and makes me realise how special that is and how much people do enjoy being a part of my journey.”

There is nothing wrong with either sentiment, of course. Their job is tennis. Talking about it is an obligation. Some do it better than others.

Konta now has the task of building on some excellent results and performances at this tournament: revenge against two recent conquerors in Hsieh Su-wei in the first round (having lost to her at the same stage at Roland Garros) and in a truly gripping three-setter to get revenge on Donna Vekic; a routine mid-tournament win over the young Greek outsider Maria Sakkari], coached for the duration by Mark Petchey; another tense victory against Caroline Garcia; and then her best showing, beating the world No2, Simona Halep, in three sets in the quarter-finals.

All of which puts her tennis in the semi-final in a tough-to-call context. Certainly Williams pulled away from her impressively in the second set but Konta did not make the most of her chances in the first, failing to build on a serve that swung between unhittable and ordinary, seven aces and four double faults – the last of them giving Williams her third match point, which she converted with elan, driving the ball sweetly down the line past Konta, who had advanced to the net in desperation rather than hope.

Facebook Twitter Pinterest Johanna Konta bids farewell to Centre Court. Photograph: Tom Jenkins/The Guardian

Yet, as Konta pointed out, there was plenty to be proud about in giving her all against someone who has visited this lofty stage so many times. But the British No1 saw old targets of her own fall, too.

She moves into the top five in the world from No7, joining Virginia Wade (No2), Sue Barker (No3) and Jo Durie (No5) as the only British women to reach that high since the computer rankings were introduced in 1975. She had already become the first British semi-finalist since Wade in 1978 and she has realistic ambitions of equalling her win of 1977.

There was a ton of pressure on Konta after Andy Murray’s pained five-set exit in the quarter-finals against Sam Querrey the day before, although she did not show it. Her focus was as fixed as the North Pole but she lost her way.

Certainly the support was loud – and, briefly, unsporting, when a small section applauded a Williams double fault and a following butchered drive volley – which Konta said later she appreciated immensely. Whether it really seeped into her consciousness is hard to tell; her coach, Wim Fissette, has said to her here and previously she should consider tapping into that psychic energy but she seems reluctant to do so. It is not part of her programme.

The fans needed something to mop up the emptiness left by the first semi-final, an embarrassingly one-sided affair that lasted only 65 minutes and gave Garbiñe Muguruza a perfunctory 6-1, 6-1 workout over the spiritually exhausted Slovakian Magdalena Rybarikova, who has exceeded all expectations in battling through with a world ranking of 87. This was her 36th slam tournament and first semi-final.

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However, no active player can match Williams’s 20 Wimbledon appearances. This was her 101st singles match at the All England Club and Konta’s 12th and her first semi-final. After a competitive and fitfully bright first set, the gap in class began to show – although Konta has beaten Williams three times.

The challenge for Williams – which partly explains her low-key demeanour – is to marry her experience to her remaining verve and give Muguruza a better match than Rybarikova managed, and perhaps one closer to that of her sister, Serena, when she beat the Spaniard in the final two years ago. That delivered the younger sister her sixth title here; victory on Saturday would do the same for Venus. That, surely, will bring a smile to her face.