French women stand out in the Judo World Ranking

In the latest IJF Judo World Ranking three countries stand out: Japan, France and Georgia. Although we know that the Japanese athlete don’t show up too much in the IJF World Judo Tour and don’t go for the points in the World Ranking, so we can see France have a strong women’s team and with two positions on the first place of the World Ranking by lightweight Shirine Boukli and heavyweight Romane Dicko, France can still represent a great team onwards the Olympic Games in Paris where the home team doesn’t even have to qualify, but the selection will likely be based upon the positions in the IJF World Ranking.

Judo pundits believed in the power of the French women at the masters in Jerusalem. There was a list of online bookies on SportyTrader that provided the odds for some of the French athletes and with a victory in Jerusalem both Boukli and Dicko were guaranteed with another 1800 points for that ranking and Boukli even took over the highest position from Japanese Natsumi Tsunoda. Romane Dicko remained the number one, just like the end of last year.

Matic is the Croatian frontrunner

Another athlete that is still number one is Barbara Matic who had an excellent year becoming World Champion for a second time.  She also collected two World titles in her junior period but no one had thought she was able to defend her world title successfully, even in an all Croatian final this year in Tashkent, the highlight of Croatian judo for sure. Matic the frontrunner and awarded in her country.

Remarkable is the resurrection of British judo with even two World Ranking leaders in Lucy Renshall and Chelsie Giles. The latter claimed a silver medal at the World Championships and captured the European title summarizing a great year for Giles. Renshall was already quite stable but was able to continue to her leading position after the GOAT, double Olympic Champion Clarisse Agbegnenou had a year off giving birth to a baby this year. Agbegnenou got injured at her comeback event and will have to wait a little while. For the first time since the start of the IJF World Tour and IJF World Ranking in 2009 two British fighters are on the top of their rankings.

Deguchi back at number one spot

Another comeback was for 2019 World Champion Christa Deguchi from Canada who won a few IJF World Tour events and recovered from not qualifying for the Games, as her compatriot Jessica Klimkait is still in a relax mode. It will again deliver judo fans a fantastic qualification onwards the Paris Games, what a luxury for Canada.

In the top five of the oldest ever World Ranking leaders since the start in 2009 is Mayra Aguiar from Brazil. She hit the jackpot for the third time this year with another world title alongside her three Olympic medals she captured in her career. With just 31 years young, she can do it again in France in not even two years-time. Aguiar leads the category U78kg.

With top events in Portugal, France and Israel, judo kicks off in 2023 like nothing had changed, but moving forward to the Games, it did with those from the masters some athletes are now in the driving seat.