Italy trailblazer of European talent

What a historical week for Italy. Last week the Italian talents had their best ever EYOF in history with five gold medals. This week at the Cadet World Championships Italy already gained two silver medals, but today Giovanni Esposito delivered the gold and secured the best ever performance of his country at World Championships.

EYOF winner Giovanni Esposito converted his European honours into world success with a dramatic late show in the -66kg final against Cadet European and EYOF bronze medallist Bagrati Niniashvili (GEO). The Italian was on the verge of defeat as he trailed to a waza-ari in the last minute but there is no quit in Esposito who stalked Niniashvili on the tatami and threw him with uchi-mata-sukashi for ippon with 10 seconds left.

In the first semi-final Napoli-based Esposito, who cites senior Italian team member Elio Verde as his hero, bested Cadet European champion Bilal Ciloglu (TUR) by a waza-ari while in the second semi-final Niniashvili (GEO) downed 17-year-old Ugur Sarikaya (TUR) by ippon.

The first bronze medal was claimed by beaten semi-finalist Sarikaya (TUR) who defeated 17-year-old Zhankozha Marat (KAZ) on shido penalties. The second bronze medal was captured by Ishigooka Hideyuki (JPN) who continued Japan’s productive second day at the expense of Ciloglu (TUR) by ippon after three minutes.