The second youngest competitor of the Olympic judo competition, 18 year old Tara Babulfath (SWE) was the stumbling block for Scutto. Working hard with de-ashi-barai and always in form in ne-waza, the Swede threw and then held the Italian champion to find herself in the semi-final of the Olympic Games.
In pool B, Natsumi Tsunoda (JPN) put paid to French hopes, throwing Boukli for ippon with the most perfectly placed tomoe-nage, a clean ippon score. So, Babulfath will face Tsunoda in the semi-final during the final block.
Bavuudorj (MGL) held her nerve and her ranking, storming past Esposito (MLT), Tanzer (AUT) and the surprise quarter-final entry, Narvaez (PAR) to win her quarter. The Paraguayan had passed Aymard (GAB) before throwing 6th seed Costa for ippon in golden score to then face Bavuudorj in the quarter-final.
The Mongolian’s opposition in the semi-final will be the Spanish athlete, Martinez Abelenda. Coach Quino Ruiz was emotional to see his athlete throw number 3 seed Abuzhakynova (KAZ) in the quarter-final.
The final block, at 4pm local time, will see the repechage contests first, Scutto and Boukli and then Narvaez will face Abuzhakynova. They will be followed by the semi-finals. We know that Sweden, Japan, Mongolia and Spain will fight for medals but with two additional nations known after the repechage. We are getting ready to know the name of a new Olympic champion.