The Cuban judo team fell to Ukraine in its first outing in the mixed team tournament at the World Championships which takes place in Tashkent, Uzbekistan.
For Cuba, the first to go out on the tatami was Arnaes Odelín, who fell in the 57 kilograms against Daria Bilodid. Then Magdiel Estrada (73 kg) and Maylín del Toro (63 kg) won their respective fights against Artem Khomula and Nataliia Chystiakova, with which the Cubans went up, according to the state media note Cubadebate.
However, Iván Silva (90kg) suffered a surprise loss at the hands of Stanislav Gunchenko, who again leveled the shares. The Olympic champion and twice world monarch Idalis Ortiz (+78 kg)asserted his favoritism and beat Yelyzaveta Lytvynenko.
With Cuba ahead due to Ortiz’s victory, it was his turn to fight Andy Granda, who the previous day had been crowned world champion in the +100 kg division, which made him expect a victory over Yakiv Khammo, who, however, defeated him by two waza-aris.
Both judokas faced each other again, since this division had been chosen to define the match, in case of a tiebreaker. In this second opportunity against Khamo, Granda lost again, this time by ippon, which marked the definitive defeat of Cuba.
In the final of the tournament, the mixed teams of France and Japan faced each other, just like in the Tokyo 2020 Olympic Games. This time, the Asians took revenge and took the title. Germany and Israel took the silver and bronze medals.
In this World Championship, the Cuban representation won the first gold medal in eight years. The last representative of the Island to win a title in contests of this type had been the multi-medallist Ortiz (Chelyabinsk 2014), who on this occasion was in seventh place in her division, after winning her first two fights and losing another two by disqualification. .
Granda’s title was also the first for Cuba in the men’s branch since Rio de Janeiro 2013points Cubadebate not to mention that the champion at that time was Asley González. The also London 2012 Olympic runner-up retired from active sport on the Island in 2017, emigrated and currently competes for Romania.
Granda’s gold medal and the eighth place for Cuba in the competition by countries of the recently completed world championship constitute progress, taking into account that the 2021 edition the delegation left without medals.
