Photo: Fédération Internationale de Judo
Havana, May 12 (ACN) -- Cuban judo fighter Ivan Silva finished in fifth place in the individual tournament of the World Championship in Doha, Qatar, after losing by ippon and Golden Rule to Japan's Sanshiro Murao in the bronze medal match.
According to the site of the International Federation www.ijf.org, Silva, in the 90 kilograms (kg) ended the regulation time with a warning -shido- against him, received another one in the extension, as well as the Japanese, who finally achieved the projection that guaranteed him the victory.
The road to the fight for the victory was exhausting for the matancero, since all the fights were decided in Golden Rule, with wins by ippon against French Maxime-Gael Ngayad and Azerbaijan's Muarad Fatiyev, but then he lost in the quarterfinals and by the same way against Italian Christiano Parlati, who sent him to the repechage.
In that phase, the outstanding Cuban athlete, world runner-up in Baku 2022 and bronze medalist in the Grand Slam of Paris and Tbilisi, both in 2023, also beat Noel Ven Tend of the Netherlands by ippon, a victory that guaranteed him to seek the first medal of the largest of the Antilles in the world championship, but the Japanese Murao prevented him from doing so.
Murao is the second in the world ranking (RM), the runner-up of the Grand Slam of Tashkent 2023, the winner of the Masters of Jerusalem 2022 and the bronze medalist of the Grand Slam of Tokyo 2022.
Idelannis Gómez (70 kg), who lost by ippon to Slovakian Anka Pogacnik, third in the world ranking, also competed for Cuba today.
Previously, the largest of the Antilles had failed attempts with Arnaes Odelín (57 kg), Magdiel Estrada (73 kg) and Maylín del Toro (63 kg), all three in their first performances.
Silva's fifth-place finish placed Cuba 22nd in the standings, on par with the United Kingdom, Azerbaijan, Mexico, Turkey and Venezuela.
Japan (4-2-4) remains at the top of the medal table, followed by Georgia (2-1-1), France (1-1-2), Canada (1-0-1), Spain (1-0-0) and Switzerland (1-0-0), the six nations owning the 10 crowns shared so far.
This Friday, Cuba's Liester Cardona (100 kg) will take to the tatamis against Britain's Harry Lovell-Kewitt, while on Saturday, the last day of the individual competition, Andy Granda (+100) and Idalis Ortiz (+78 kg) will make their debut.
Granda will face the winner of the match between Senegal's Mbagnick Ndiaye and Romania's Mircea Croitoru, and Ortiz will face Turkey's Dilo Kiara.
In the individual tournament, 657 judokas -343 men and 314 women- from 99 participating countries are participating in search of points for the world and Olympic rankings for the Paris Games.
