Galstyan stuns favourites to win judo gold

Russia's Arsen Galstyan upset the top two seeds, including a 40-second final triumph over Japan's Hiroaki Hiraoka, to win the men's under-60kg judo gold medal at the Olympics on Saturday. The fourth seed produced a stunning finale to flatten second seed Hiraoka with a sweeping, winding throw (harai-maki-komi). It completed a unique double for the 23-year-old who had also shocked double world champion and world number one Rishod Sobirov of Uzbekistan in the semis. The final was a short-lived affair but the end was dramatic. Galstyan showed no nerves as he attacked his Japanese foe with an inner leg throw (uchi-mata). Hiraoka resisted and even tried to counter with a pick-up (te-guruma), but when that failed he was immediately hit with a counter-counter which Galstyan made stick, flinging his opponent through the air until he came crashing down on his back. There was a brief moment of uncertainty as the referee initially gave a waza-ari half point score. But he was overruled by the refereeing commission, who consulted the video replay, and the full technical knock-out ippon was rightly given. Galstyan had begun his day by winning his first two combats with arm-locks (juji-gatame) before needing a judges' decision to overcome South Korea's Choi Gwang-Hyeon in the quarter-finals. In the semi-finals he was largely dominated by Sobirov, who is so far ahead of his rivals in the world rankings that he has almost double the points of anyone else. But Galstyan held on and took the fight into a sudden-death golden score period. And when Sobirov made a mistake trying to pull out of a weak shoulder throw (seoi-nage) attack, the Russian pounced, hauling him over with a valley-drop (tani-otoshi) counter technique. Alongside French heavyweight Teddy Riner, Sobirov had been the most overwhelming favourite for gold in the competition. And he looked destined to improve on the bronze he'd won four years ago in Beijing in a blistering start in which he blew away his first three opponents by ippon. But after losing to Galstyan he then earned some measure of recompense by beating France's Sofiane Milous for a second straight bronze. Brazilian Felipe Kitadai, who had lost to Sobirov in the quarter-finals, came back through the repechage to beat Italy's Elio Verde for the other bronze.