World number one Dinara Safina ended Kim Clijsters' brilliant run at the Western & Southern Financial Group Women's Open.
Clijsters, playing her first WTA Tour event since coming out of retirement, had knocked out top-20 players Marion Bartoli, Patty Schnyder and Svetlana Kuznetsova to reach the quarter-finals.
The 26-year-old, who spent more than two years out of the sport and became a mother in February 2008, was looking to take a further step by reaching the semi-finals.
However Russian Safina was too strong for the former US Open champion, and the top seed won 6-2 7-5.
Her semi-final opponent will be 14th-seeded Italian Flavia Pennetta who beat unseeded Slovakian Daniela Hantuchova 6-3 6-3.
Fourth seed Elena Dementieva raced through her quarter-final against Denmark's Caroline Wozniacki, hammering the 19-year-old 6-2 6-1 in one hour and 13 minutes.
Her semi-final opponent will be fifth seed Jelena Jankovic, who made short work of beating Austria's Sybille Bammer 6-0 6-3.
Bammer had beaten 13th seed Agnieszka Radwanska and second seed Serena Williams to reach the last eight but appeared to run out of steam against her Serbian opponent, who won in one hour and two minutes.
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