The first one to make history for her country was Croatia, with the amazing performance of Barbara Matic who made it into the Olympic Final. There was also a masterclass from Murao under the intense pressure of the French crowd in the arena while Spain’s Tristani Mosakhlishvili lost to Theodoros Tselidis from Greece.

In his own country, the crowd was amazed by the bronze for France with a third place for Maxime-Gaël Ngayap Hambou in judo men’s 90kg. 

Lasha Bekauri also inscribed his name for the second time in the Olympic pantheon, while he had seemed a little out of breath during the first rounds, as the competition progressed, we saw him gain strength. In his very particular style, he seemed invincible, even when he was thrown by Murao at the beginning of the final. 

As a surprise, some of the medallists were not among the favourites this morning, they are now on the podium. This is the case of Theodoros Tselidis (GRE) and Maxime-Gael Ngayap Hambou (FRA) in the men’s category, and for the women´s, there is a new generation that is pushing hard and we see a strong European contingent since the four medal-winning judoka are all from the old continent: Matic but also (GER), Michaela Polleres (AUT) and Gabriella Willems (BEL).

There are already 22 countries that have won medals in Paris, a symbol of great diversity and universality. Tomorrow will be the light heavyweight day with the -100kg and the -78kg categories in the Olympic Village.

Women’s -70kg

• Barbara Matic (CRO) beat Miriam Butkereit (GER) 1-0 by waza-ari
• Gabriella Willems (BEL) and Michaela Polleres (AUT)

Men’s -90kg

• Lasha Bekauri (GEO) beat Murao Sanshiro (JPN) 10-1 by ippon (two waza-ari)
• Theodoros Tselidis (GRE) and Maxime-Gaël Ngayap Hambou (FRA)

Nagase defended the title

The reigning Olympic champion (Nagase) and the best judoka in the weight category over the last three years, who has won three world titles between 2022 and 2024 (Grigalashvili), were in different parts of the bracket yesterday.

World number one Matthias Casse (Belgium) and Korea’s Joonhwan Lee could have prevented this final, but Casse lost to Nagase in the quarter-finals and Lee, who had been outstanding throughout the tournament, lost to Grigalashvili in the semi-finals.

Grigalashvili was once again the favourite to win the final. He had won his last two matches against Nagase, the last one at the 2022 World Championships. But this time his Japanese opponent was much better prepared. He scored a waza-ari and then an ippon in just 1.5 minutes to become a double Olympic champion.

In the women’s 63kg, Mexico’s Prisca Awiti Alcaraz was taking on Slovenia’s Andreja Leski in the gold medal bout and was taken just 1 minute 44 seconds for Leski to score two waza-ari, adding up to an ippon. There was earlier disappointment when defending champion Clarisse Agbégnénou lost in the semi-finals to Leski, but the Fench star promptly won her bronze medal match before going to celebrate with her daughter. Kosovo’s Laura Fazliu won the other bronze medal.

Israel’s judokas snubbed by their rivals

During the first three days of the competitions, Nurali Emomali of Tajikistan took to the mat for his bout with Israel’s Baruch Shmailov but walked off without shaking hands after winning their contest in the men’s -66 kg category. Emomali’s snub followed Morocco’s Abderrahmane Boushita, who also refused to shake hands with Shmailov.

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