Today’s final at the European U23 Championships in Antalya showed the crowd some great points. In the Women’s category U78kg Audrey Tcheumeo (FRA) gave Luiza Gainutdinova (UKR) no chance against her strong grip which resulted in an ippon after she shuffled Gainutdinova over the tatami. Tcheumeo also won the European U20 title in September and a number of Top junior tournaments this year, while she’s only 19 years young and the youngest gold medalists of this European Championships.
Zafar Makhmadov (RUS) took the gold medal U100kg. He took over his opponent Daniel Matei (ROM) in the final for an ippon after Matei tried to throw him by a shoulder throw. But Makhmadov responded immediately with a take over.
Makhmadov has good memories in Turkey as this year he also won the Bosporus tournament in Istanbul. But more importantly he also won the GB World Cup in Birmingham in September and improved his bronze medal of last year’s U23 Championships (U90kg) to gold today U100kg. Daniel Matei won bronze last year and also improved his position, but not the most wanted position.
U90kg was a great weight category with experienced international fighters who had won their medals in various tournaments. The winner Karolis Bauza was senior bronze medalist at the Europeans in Tbilisi and was one of the favourites. In the final he beat Milan Randl who was European U17 Champion in 2003, and won an bronze medal U20. Now he has a set of medals in each age category, but couldn’t hold Karolis Bauza today.
Marvin de La Croes (NED), former World U20 Champion took the bronze medal as well as Max Schirnhofer (AUT) who lost last’s years final in this category in Zagreb.
In the women’s super heavy weight category Lucia Tangorre (ITA) started with a super speed to Svitlana Yaromka, but didn’t score any point with her tactics, but suddenly Yaromka scored a yuko in the first minute of the fight.
Maybe Tangorre thought about the European U20 final three year ago that she lost, Tangorre decided not to let it happen again. She looked more active, and finally leveled halfway the match, and was able to get Yaromka in a hold down due to a mistake by Yaromka and won the second Italian gold medal. This meant the victory in the women’s medal tally for Italy thanks to the other gold medal of Elena Moretti at the first day in Antalya. Sadly for Yaromka, she lost the third final for Ukraine at this championship.
In the last final of the Championships, the super heavyweight category was the decision which country would win the medal tally. Both Russia and France had two gold medals, but Soslan Dzhanaev (RUS) gave Russia the overall win in this championship. Dzhanaev was able to beat Thomas Sinou (FRA) and controlled the whole match with a superb kumi-kata and Sinou was penalized twice for holding his hands on the same side. Sinsou also lost the GB World Cup final against a Russian judoka (Dmitry Sterkhov), so he again wasn’t too happy.
Dhzanaev however lost the European U20 Championships final in 2005 and now owns the gold in his last year U23. Dhzanaev recently became Russian senior Champion and is ready for good senior results.
Russia wins the medal tally and leads for France, Germany and Italy.
