Better late than silver for golden Dutchman Michael Korrel

Dutchman Michael Korrel defeated Asian Championships silver medallist Soyib Kurbonov of Uzbekistan to win his first Grand Prix gold medal and his country’s first title in Hungary. Korrel, European Championships bronze medallist, and Kurbonov were surprise finalists as German top seed Karl-Richard Frey could only manage a fifth-place finish.

The finalists traded shido penalties rather than scores as they finished the regulatory five minutes with three shidos apiece which meant that golden score was required to declare a winner. After one minute and 26 seconds of added time it was Korrel who drove his way onto the podium with a drop seoi-nage sending Kurbonov down to the tatami for a waza-ari score.

The first bronze medal was won by Glasgow European Open silver medallist Philip Awiti-Alcaraz (GBR) who celebrated his first Grand Prix medal by throwing former world champion Elkhan Mammadov (AZE) with one of the ippons of the tournament. Mammadov attempted to bridge which sees the score given as ippon in order to discourage this defensive move to protect a fighter’s safety. The second bronze was won by Junior World Championships bronze medallist Anton Savytskiy (UKR) who shocked Rio-bound Karl-Richard Frey (GER). Savytskiy, who is one of a string of exciting prospects in the Ukrainian team, was tied after five minutes against the German judoka with a yuko apiece but Frey had been penalised three times while the IJF World Judo Tour newcomer had only been penalised once to clinch his first senior medal on the world stage.