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Battling Belgian Jasper Lefevere makes his mark

Battling Belgian Jasper Lefevere makes his mark

12 Sep 2014 18:50
by Mark Pickering - IJF
IJF Media Team / International Judo Federation

San Salvador Pan American Open bronze medallist Jasper LEFEVERE (BEL) pictured this day in his mind last night and delivered the best case scenario as he won-66kg gold against Havana Grand Prix bronze medallist Alim GADANOV (RUS). LEFEVERE, 26, finished fifth in Rijeka a year ago, and as that was the closest he has been to a Grand Prix medal it was only fitting for him to finally achieve that feat in Croatia.

Former European champion GADANOV, 30, was overlooked for the World Championships and almost responded in the best possible way but LEFEVERE had his own designs on making a statement and did so by defeating GADANOV by ippon in 51 seconds with a ko-uchi-gari. 
 
 
In the first semi-final home LEFEVERE saw off IJF World Judo Tour newcomer Sinan SANDAL (TUR) who surpised top seed Colin OATES (GBR) in his first contest. LEFEVERE took the lead with a yuko and wrapped up the victory with a tate-shiho-gatame for 20 seconds to earn ippon. In the second semi-final GADANOV outclassed 19-year-old Junior World bronze medallist Adrian GOMBOC (SLO). GADANOV is as seasoned a judoka as there is on the circuit while GOMBOC is still finding his feet at this level and was caught with ashi-waza for waza-ari before being pinned for 15 seconds as his Russian adversary won by wazari-awasette-ippon.  
 
The first bronze medal was won by GOMBOC who defeated Sofia European Open bronze medallist Andraz JEREB (SLO) who finished fifth in Rijeka last year. The teammates cancelled each other out for five minutes with a shido apiece to initiate golden score. GOMBOC went close with a sumi-gaeshi after 40 seconds and that positive action was deemed enough to penalise JEREB for passivity as the former won the domestic bragging rights for Slovenia. The second bronze medal contest was won by Minsk European Open bronze medallist Tal FLICKER (ISR) in a scoreless contest against Turkish judoka SANDAL. FLICKER, 22, who was fighting for the first Grand Prix medal of his young career, emerged with the win by way of shido penalties after SANDAL recieved a second shido following both judoka being penalised for an overly defensive posture. 
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