Roger Federer was the major casualty on men's quarter-final day at Wimbledon as he tumbled to a five-set defeat against Jo-Wilfried Tsonga.

The match which became a sensational Centre Court contest began with third seed Federer easing through the first set and then taking a one-sided tie-break in the second.

But French 12th seed Tsonga claimed an early break in the third set, and with Federer finding his opponent's serve impenetrable that led to a 3-6 6-7 (7/3) 6-4 6-4 6-4 triumph.

"I thought I played a good match myself. I'm actually pretty pleased with my performance," Federer said.

"It's hard going out of the tournament that way, but unfortunately it does happen sometimes.

"At least it took a special performance to beat me, which is somewhat nice.

"I think he played an amazing match. He didn't give me many chances."

Tsonga celebrated with a dance across the court, and said: "It was amazing today. I played unbelievable.

"To come from two sets down - that's crazy.

"He is the biggest champion in my sport. He's achieved lots of things and he's the best player in the world."

Federer's defeat ended the prospect of the top four seeds reaching the semi-finals of back-to-back grand slams.

It happened at the recent French Open, but has never occurred in successive slams during the modern era.

Number two seed Novak Djokovic awaits Tsonga in the semi-finals tomorrow.

The Serbian was not at his best against teenage Australian Bernard Tomic but did enough to post a 6-2 3-6 6-3 7-5 win.

Djokovic was error-prone against his Australian practice partner, had his serve broken three times and needed a run of seven straight games spanning the third and fourth sets to gain control.

Looking ahead to the match against Tsonga, Djokovic said: "I really need to work on my game. I hope I can perform a little bit better than I did today.

Top seed Nadal recovered from a mid-match dip to stroll to a four-set win over American Mardy Fish on Court One.

He broke the Fish serve three times in the opening set and went two sets up.

Fish raised his game to take the third set, but a clinical break at the start of the fourth was enough for Nadal to take the match 6-3 6-3 5-7 6-4.