In the final, double world bronze medallist Enkhrillen Lkhagvatogoo (MGL) had to take on Olympic and double world champion Rafaela Silva (BRA), a twenty-time grand slam medallist; not a task for the faint-hearted. Lkhagvatogoo was fast and gave all, but thirty-three year old Silva has fantastic ne-waza and used it perfectly to finish the contest by armlock in just 40 seconds, after chasing the Mongolian athlete to the ground as soon as she attacked.
An emotional Silva has never won gold in Paris, with all her accolades and achievements; it was missing until today!
There was a bronze medal up for grabs for either Friederike Stolze (GER) or Kirari Yamaguchi (JPN) and it was an unknown claimant until just 8 seconds before the end of normal time. It was only then that Yamaguchi managed to complete her hold for ippon. Stolze had fought a great match but couldn’t resist on the ground.
World champion Joanne Van Lieshout (NED) would face top seed Iva Oberan (CRO) for the second of the two bronze medals and the former was ready to strengthen her CV. She put the first score on the board with a dynamic, spinning uchi-mata, not quite getting the landing required to be scored ippon. Oberan answered with a strong, top, left grip but she couldn’t execute a scoring technique from there, such was Van Lieshout’s defence.
As the clock ticked down, Oberan had to open up and do more and as she attacked, the Dutch champion was ready and stayed on her back, converting the exchange into a win by kansetsu-waza.
