Defending champion Abe suffers defeat

PARIS — Japan’s Uta Abe, the reigning Olympic champion in the -52kg judo competition, suffered an upset defeat in the round of 16.

Abe, who had not lost a fight in an individual competition since 2019, was beaten by Uzbekistan’s Diyora Keldiyorova, twice silver medallist at the world championships.

After Keldiyorova had won by Ippon, Abe sank to her knees holding her head in her hands as she tried to come to terms with what had happened.

After saluting her opponent she struggled to walk and fell to her knees again before sobbing in the arms of her coach, Reuters reported.

The 24-year-old Abe won the gold medal in Tokyo in 2021 shortly after her brother Hifumi Abe achieved the same feat.

The four-times world champion, who had only participated in one competition this year, started her day with an easy win over Canadian Kelly Deguchi.

Elsewhere, Japan’s Hifumi Abe retained his men’s under 66kg crown before Diyora Keldiyorova, who had ended Abe’s sister’s Olympic title defence earlier in the day, won Uzbekistan’s first judo gold medal in the women’s under 52kg class.

Abe pointed two fingers in the air after beating Brazilian Willian Lima in the final to indicate that he now owned two Olympic gold medals, including the one he won in front of empty stands in Tokyo during the COVID pandemic three years ago.

“I had never seen that view, of the venue filled with people. And here I had my whole family watching,” Abe said, adding that he would be back to defend the title in Los Angeles in 2028.

Lima, disappointed that he had missed his shot at gold, thought the ippon that gave Abe victory was not a point.

“You have this chance only one or two times in your career, and you have to grab that medal. And today I couldn’t,” he said.

Keldiyorova had elbowed her way into the final on the back of an ippon upset of Uta Abe in the round of 16, ending the reigning champion’s unbeaten run in individual competition that went back to 2019.

Abe, who had won gold within 30 minutes of her brother in Tokyo, sank to her knees holding her head in her hands as she tried to come to terms with what had happened.

In the final, 26-year-old Keldiyorova took an early lead over Distria Krasniqi of Kosovo and held on to win her first major global title after two silvers and a bronze at three world championships.

There were tears aplenty earlier in the women’s competition, when Brazilian Larissa Pimenta and Amandine Buchard, silver medallist behind Abe in Tokyo, both won bronzes.

Buchard was roared on by a partisan crowd as she earned a third judo medal for the host nation at the Paris Games and the twice European champion was mobbed by friends and family in the stands at the Champ-de-Mars Arena.

Pimenta, who was also knocked out by Abe three years ago in Tokyo, overcame Odette Giuffrida to claim her first Olympic medal, collapsing on the mat in floods of tears as the Italian congratulated her.

Gusman Kyrgyzbayev of Kazakhstan and Denis Vieru of Moldova won the bronze medals in the men’s competition.

Natsumi Tsunoda gave Japan a winning start in the Olympic judo, taking women’s under-48kg gold as the competition started in Paris with the two lightest weight classes.

In the men’s under-60kg final, Kazakhstan’s Yeldos Smetov edged French hope Luka Mkheidze despite the roaring support of a packed crowd at the temporary arena on the Champs de Mars.

Tsunoda, who dropped a weight class after missing her home Games in Tokyo injured, secured gold in her first Olympics with just over a minute left in her final, rolling on her back and flipping Baasankhuu Bavuudorj head-first to the mat.

That was enough for the lesser score of waza-ari. Tsunoda, 31, had her Mongolian opponent firmly round the neck as the gong sounded.

When Smetov won silver in Rio in 2016 the feat was commemorated in Kazakhstan with a stamp showing him biting his medal. “I had been waiting for a long time for a gold medal,” he said. “

I was almost waiting on the sidelines, having won silver at Rio and bronze in Tokyo.” He scored the only point by levering his opponent into the mat.