If their female counterparts shine this Saturday, this was not the case for the French judokas, far from the podiums.
In the absence of those selected for the next Paris 2024 Olympic Games in each of the three men’s categories of the day, the probability of seeing a French judoka bring home a European medal from Zagreb appeared very slim. And unfortunately, there was no miracle or feat. Even if the blow didn’t go that far in the under 90kg category…
Indeed, once we put aside the less than 100kg where France had no representative – due to Aurélien Diesse’s withdrawal – as well as the more than 100kg where, in the absence of Teddy Riner, the inexperienced Khamzat Saparbaev and Matheo Akiana Mongo only won one fight out of three contested, the hope of a podium was kept alive by the Alexis Mathieu-Loris Tassier tandem.
Both in the quarter-finals, however, they failed to enter the last four, Mathieu failing on waza-ari against the Azeri Murad Fatiyev while Tassier lost on penalties against the Romanian Alex Cret. However, they still had the repechage to aim for a bronze medal but Alexis Mathieu could do nothing against the very solid Dutchman Noel Van T End. Same observation of helplessness for Loris Tassier against the Georgian Lasha Bekauri. The step was simply too high for the Blues this Saturday.
