Ungvari brothers both win gold

Hungarian judoka Attila Ungvari claimed the gold medal U81kg at the Grand Slam in Tashkent. Ungvari, already with 14 medals from the circuit, laid a serious and diligent course from the beginning of the morning. Coached by his brother Miklos, who was in the prime of Hungarian judo for years, Attila applied the instructions to the letter, allowing himself to beat Muso Sobirov (UZB) in the semi-finals, despite massive public support for the Uzbek judoka.

On the other side, we found Shamil Borchashvili (AUT), a well-known judoka too, since he is none other than the bronze medallist from the last Olympic Games. We will remember that today, the category was a family affair, while one Ungvari was coaching another and the two Borchashvili brothers were involved in the competition. Moreover, Attila won against Wachid Borchashvili in the quarter-finals, Shamil's brother.

Halfway through a final that was pretty closed, there was only one shido apiece. Things became a little more tricky for Borchashvili, when he was penalised for a second time, for a gripping infringement.

Then it was time for golden score. The match remained closed until Attila produced a beautiful sumi-gaeshi for waza-ari and took the gold medal for Hungary and for team Ungvari.

The first match for a bronze medal saw Wachid Borchashvili face Somon Makhmadbekov (TJK) and the latter quickly took the advantage with a first waza-ari from a well prepared o-uchi-gari and then controlled the rest of the match tactically to win his second bronze medal in a grand slam.

Uzbekistan was guaranteed a medal too as Sharofiddin Boltaboev (UZB) and Muso Sobirov (UZB) qualified for the bronze medal match. In less than 20 seconds, Boltaboev was stunned by the first soto-makikomi attack of Sobirov, who earned a waza-ari, but a few seconds later, ippon was awarded, after review, for that brilliant attack. The bronze was for Sobirov.

Today's final was a tense affair contested by World Tour veteran Attila Ungvari (HUN) and Olympic bronze medallist Shamil Borchashvili (AUT), with the Hungarian eventually winning out in golden score. Besides the final, there was notable bronze medal success for Somon Makhmadbekov (TJK) who took his first World Tour medal since moving up from -73kg in August last year, at the 5th time of asking.