Junior Judo World Championship: Teams put on a show on day 5 as Japan protected its title
On the final day of the Judo Junior World Mixed Team Championship in Dushanbe, Japan defended their title with a 4-2 victory over France. Korea claimed bronze after defeating Mongolia 4-0, while Uzbekistan took the other bronze with a win over Azerbaijan.
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00:00This is the final teams tournament in Dushanbe, Tajikistan's capital city that hosts the
00:07Judo Junior World Mixed Team Championships.
00:14The teams is an event like no other.
00:17It takes the individual sport of Judo and brings six players together, three male and
00:21three female to form one united team and the atmosphere is electric.
00:29In the first bronze medal contest, the Republic of Korea faced Team Mongolia.
00:35The Korean team was in great form and quickly raced to a 4-0 victory and a spot on the podium.
00:46The passionate Tajik crowd were very excited for the next contest as their close neighbor
00:50Uzbekistan took on Azerbaijan for the other bronze.
00:55A memorable matchup went back and forth.
01:00But after a fight back from Azerbaijan, it was Uzbekistan who eventually sealed the victory
01:05and the other bronze medal when Mardon Ravshanov defeated Vusal Galandarzadeh in the deciding
01:11contest.
01:14The final was between eternal rivals France and Japan and the expectation was for it to
01:19be a classic.
01:22Judo world champion Melchior Oshikorn got France off the perfect start scoring Ippon
01:27against Rin Maeda resulting 1-0 for France.
01:31But Komei Kawabata leveled things at 1-1 against Ivan Sherneschenko.
01:39After that, things turned back in favor of France again thanks to Celia Kankan after
01:43she won with two Waza-ari scores against Chishiro Yamaguchi 2-1 for France.
01:50However, after Nozomu Miki edged a tight contest with Maxence Bordin and Riko Honda scored
01:56Waza-ari against Alia de Carvalho, it fell to Keito Kihara to take the fourth and decisive
02:03victory against Peter Jan.
02:05Scoreboard show 4-2.
02:09At the end, Japan defended their junior world mixed team title from 2023.
02:14The next generation of Judo looks safe in the hands of this outstanding Japanese team.
02:22The gold medals were handed out by the IGF Head Referee Director Armen Bagdasarov.
02:31And the Tajik Judo President Ismail Mehmet Zoyer gave the champions their trophy.
02:38There were joyous scenes as the medalists received their awards.
02:44We spoke to the team and to the man who earned the decisive victory.
02:50I wanted to win so much that I could die.
02:54Thank you, Dushanbe.