After the unexpected and beautiful exploit of Thauany David Capanni Dias (third among the -57 kg) on day-1, a second negative day for Italy at the Almada 2023 Grand Prix, the first judo World Tour event of the season. Today there were six Azzurri athletes engaged on the Portuguese tatami, but none managed to get close to the Final Block.
The only victory today came in the 73 kg with Alessandro Magnani, good at prevailing for waza-ari on the Dutch Koen Heg before giving way for ippon to the South Korean Heoncheol Kang. In the same weight category Edward Mella he was instead defeated in his debut by ippon (double waza-ari) by the Portuguese host Joao Crisostomo.
Still in the men’s field, but in the category up to 81 kg, the two Italians in the competition left the scene in the first round. Bright Maddalonireigning European junior silver, lost by waza-ari at the Golden Score with the Spanish Jose Maria Mendiola Izquieta, while Leonard Casaglia he had to surrender by ippon to the Japanese Naoto Izawa in 3’12”.
Judo, Capanni Dias amazes everyone and gets on the podium in the Almada Grand Prix! New earliness record for the blue
Nothing to do in the 70 kg even for Irene Pedrotti, settled for waza-ari in regular time by the Uzbek Shokhista Nazarova. Finally, great regrets in the 63 kg per Sara Lisciani (twice European junior medalist), forced to surrender by Mongolian Yesui Darkhanbatbayar in a ground fight phase after waza-ari took the lead.
Below the summary of the podiums of the second day of the Judo Grand Prix Portugal 2023:
-63 kg F
1 Fear (For)
2 Moraes (Bra)
3 Cabana Perez (Esp) and Oberan (Cro)
-70 kg F
1 Coughlan (Aus)
2 Rodriguez (Ven)
3 Eriksson (Swe) and Gercsak (Hun)
-73 kg M
1 Nomonov (Uzb)
2 Smagulov (Kaz)
3 Kang (Cor) and Aranda Olalla (Esp)
-81 kg M
1 Lee (Kor)
2 Hajiyev (Aze)
3 De Wit (Ned) and Latisev (Mda)
Photo: IJF
