Denis Vieru claims fourth World Tour gold

Number 18 in the World Ranking List, Denis Vieru, world championship bronze medallist, is one of those experienced athletes who came to Zagreb to re-launch their career. The Moldovan was among the outsiders for an Olympic medal in Tokyo but things did not go as he planned. Only 25 years old, Vieru now has a couple of years to prepare to perform in Paris. In the final he was opposed to Abdula Abdulzhalilov (RUS), already 30 and winner of two grand slams in his career.

Vieru, with his beautiful judo style, waited for the Abdulzhalilov storm to pass, controlling the attacks of his opponent with calmness, before concluding on the floor with a neat sankaku-jime attempt, followed by an immobilisation for ippon and a second grand prix gold medal.

The first bronze medal contest saw Strahinja Buncic (SRB), fifth at the last European Championships and Karo Marandian (UKR), second at the Warsaw Open in 2020, competing for a place on the podium. Both competitors were clearly lacking precision in their movements. Nevertheless, Karo Marandian was able to score a waza-ari with ippon-ko-uchi-gake, that he protected until the end of the match, to win his first bronze medal in a grand prix.

The second bronze medal was disputed between Aram Grigoryan (RUS), fifth place at the Kazan Grand Slam this season and Daniel Perez Roman (ESP), fifth at the Osaka Grand Slam in 2020. Half way to the end, Grigoryan scored a first waza-ari with an o-soto-gari, followed a few seconds later by another throw, for ippon this time, to harvest a fifth medal in a grand prix.