Day Two at the Paris Grand Slam is Raising the Roof of the Accor Arena

The seven heavier categories kicked off at quite a pace; from 10:30am the almost-full arena heard applause and cheers for the dynamic judo of this multi-generational tournament.

At -81 kg, for example, the number one seed, 2021 world champion Matthias Casse, arrived in Paris with few reference points in relation to the new refereeing rules, just like all the judoka involved this inaugural grand slam. This first event of the new Olympic cycle therefore marked a turning point in the preparation for the years to come.

The French capital has its share of memories for the Belgian champion. There are the good ones, with a victory here in 2020 which opened the doors to the world number one spot. There was also the disappointment of a poor performance at the Paris 2024 Games.

In the first round at the Accor Arena he had to wait for golden score to pass the Brazilian Luan Almeida with a shoulder throw. In the next round he faced the Japanese judoka Yoshiho Hojo, aged only 23 but already a winner in Dushanbe last year. Casse once again engaged his shoulder technique but it was blocked perfectly by Hojo, who countered and sent him landing flat on his back for an indisputable ippon.

Casse had one more repechage fight to try to find his smile again in Paris. Against Dvalishvili (GEO) he collected yuko scores with his tomoe-nage, staying safe in ne-waza, to ensure that he would fight for a medal.

While the competition was in full swing, the public already had their eyes fixed on pool D which, logically, should be dominated by Olympic bronze medallist Joonhwan Lee (KOR). However, the latter was surprised by a fiery Arnaud Aregba (FRA). A first waza-ari from a turnover still counted as a tachi-waza technique and was confirmed by an ippon a few seconds later from a massive pick-up of incredible power. In a marathon match, Aregba then won against Omar Rajabli (AZE) and without a doubt the encouragement of the thousands of spectators present today contributed to this victory.

Meanwhile, more discreetly, François Gauthier-Drapeau (CAN) and Nugzari Tatalashvili (UAE) dampened the hopes of all their adversaries to reach their respective semi-finals. Aregba then lost his semi-final to the particularly well prepared Canadian. Gauthier-Drapeau was on fine form in every contest ahead of the final.

Tatalashvili’s route to the final still had to pass through Hojo (JPN) but he rose to that challenge admirably, notching up two waza-ari scores to get the job done.

At -100 kg, Fonseca (POR) looked to have brought all his determination with him. His osoto and o-uchi attacks hit hard and he pushed past Olivar (FRA) and Silva Morales (CUB) to reach an expected semi-final position, despite the difficulty of the pool. The double world champion has not come to Paris to play!

The other seeded athlete to obey his rank was Leonardo Goncalves (BRA) who, in round two, armlocked Koki Kumasaka (JPN) before then beating Savytskiy (UKR) to set-up a semi-final with Fonseca. That semi-final also went Brazil’s way, juji-gatame being Fonseca’s nemesis.

Elsewhere in the category the seeds didn’t do so well, Korrel (NED) getting knocked out straight away by Kim (KOR) and Adamian (IJF) thrown by Kostoev (UAE) in just 11 seconds with a stunning tai-otoshi. Adamian came back strongly in the repechage though to book his place in the afternoon session Kostoev also continued to move forward throwing Baghirov (AZE), the winner of pool A, for ippon with sumi-gaeshi.

The French hopes at -70 kg were pinned firmly on world champion Marie-Eve Gahie who they willed to be recovered from her loss at the Olympic Games just a few short months ago. Gahie was not on the form they wished for though, losing to young Mayu Honda of Japan, the ne-waza expert mentioned in our event preview a few days ago:

https://www.ijf.org/news/show/three-things-to-look-out-for-at-the-2025-paris-grand-slam

Honda’s opponent in the semi-final was Margit De Voogd (NED), uchi-mata being her first weapon of choice, confidence in ne-waza being her second. Her compatriot, drawn in the same pool due to the ranking, went out at the beginning of the day. This was a big opportunity for De Voogd to overtake her teammate in the domestic battle. Honda didn’t allow De Voogd the chance to stretch too far ahead though, winning the semi-final to send De Voogd down to the bonze medal contest against Pedrotti (ITA).

The second semi-final was contested by 2023 Paris winner Ai Tsunoda-Roustant (ESP) and a relative unknown, Lucie Jarrot (FRA). The Frenchwoman has no prior result on the World Judo Tour and has never fought at a grand slam before but she threw Eriksson (SWE) for waza-ari early on and then passed the experienced Romanian, Moscalu to ensure her place in the final block, one way or another.

Tsunoda-Roustant won that semi-final with a huge left-handed ippon-seoi-nage just before the halfway point, sending Jarrot to the bronze medal contest to face Gahie. Moscalu also ended up fighting for bronze despite leading her repechage final, thrown for ippon by Pedrotti with a powerful ko-soto-gake.

The seeds are, as usual, enjoying and conversely suffering mixed fortunes in all categories. The number one at +100 kg, world champion Andy Granda (CUB), was left disappointed after losing on penalties to Seungyeob Lee (KOR), who then won his quarter-final too, but it was world champion Inal Tasoev (IJF) who claimed the biggest gaze of the spectators. He arrived in Paris as the second seed and was clearly keen to uphold his duty to reach the final. He did just that, passing a very well prepared Belgian in the semi-final, Toma Nikiforov.

At -78 kg all 4 top seeds reached their respective semi-finals, dominating the group. Inbar Lanir (ISR), world champion and Olympic silver medallist, Fanny Estelle Posvite (FRA), a world medallist, Patricia Sampaio (POR), an Olympic medallist, and 34-year old Audrey Tcheumeo (FRA) double Olympic and 4-time world medallist offered quite a semi-final line-up! In the end though it was the two veterans, Tcheumeo and Posvite, who had to settle for bronze medal contests, the energy of Lanir and Sampaio proving to be a challenge too far.

The -90 kg group also had some names! The semi-final of the second half between two world champions, Luka Maisuradze (GEO) and Goki Tajima (JPN) was something to behold but a single waza-ari decided it. After 45 seconds of the contest, Maisuradze was given a shido for passivity and his response was indisputable, a huge soto-makikomi which was rewarded with a waza-ari score. He held the score under incredible pressure to reach his first Paris final having won two bronzes from editions gone by.

On the top half of the -90 kg draw, Macedo (BRA), the number one seed had to bow out against Jonghoon Kim, who incidentally also removed Igolnikov (IJF) from the gold medal race. Kim headed into a semi-final against a French favourite, Maximi-Gael Ngayap Hambou but the crowd couldn't affect the result and Kim went through, dropping Ngayap Hambou into an all-French bronze medal contest.

Despite the french heavyweight women’s school remaining strong, there were to be no all-French medal matches at +78 kg. Raz Hershko has an impressive track record as a European and world medallist and a finalist at the last Olympic Games in Paris. Every time she competes in a World Judo Tour competition, we can expect a great show. Facing Anne Fatoumata M Bairo (FRA) in the first round, the Israeli took her time to secure a tactical victory on penalties. If she knows how to take risks, she also knows how to wait.

Unfortunately for Raz, the second round against Mao Arai (JPN) was more complex and the doors to the semi-final closed for Hershko. A bronze medal remained within reach. Before that, she won against Karen Stevenson (NED) in the repechage final, having seen the Dutchwoman eliminate Coralie Hayme (FRA) with a superb rolling seoi-otoshi during the preliminary rounds.

In the absence of Romane Dicko, there was still another good card to play with Léa Fontaine (FRA), who took her destiny in hand and progressed in the tournament by lining up victories right through to the final. However, things were difficult in the semi-final against Korean judoka Hayun Kim who pushed for but never caught up with the yuko behind she had conceeded to the Frenchwoman. Fontaine could already release a few tears of joy.

Fontaine was not yet at the end of her Korean race, since in the final she would find the other judoka from the Land of the Morning Calm in her way, Hyeonji Lee, who had defeated Arai (JPN) in the previous round.

For those reaching the 5pm final block, there was still a lot at stake. Winning a Paris medal is a big achievement, winning the gold can elevate a judoka considerably and so the afternoon session promised to deliver a fantastic show.