Four Asian men in the semi finals U60kg

The first day of the World Championships delivered quite a few upsets already. In the semi finals no European athlete is lined-up. In the men’s U60kg category, seven out of eight athletes came from Asia, only Felipe Kitadai of Brazil was among the eight but in the semis only Asian judoka. The Kazach judoka spurred up the crowd with their good performances.

Both 23-year old Rustam Ibrayev and in fact Kazachstan’s number one Yeldos Smetov are in good shape. Ibrayev even shows the best judo today and he reached the semi final. He defeated last year’s bronze Amiran Papinashvili among his four wins. Now he will face World Champion Ganbat Boldbaatar of Mongolia in the semi final.

Yeldos Smetov will have to deal with Japanese hope Shishime Toru. Smetov won four matches and defeated Diyorbek Urozboev in the quarter final. The Uzbek kicked out Vice World Champion Beslan Mudranov out of the tournament.

Four Asians in the semi finals, an interesting indication for next year’s Olympic Games. The last non Asian to win the World Championships U60kg was Georgii Zantaraia in 2009. The best position ever for host Kazachstan was a 5^th plae at World Championships, that is guaranteed achieved by two men, but with chances for more.

Semi Finals:

Ganbat vs. Ibrayev 0-0

Smetov vs Shishime 3-2

2013 1-0 Tokyo

2014 1-1 Düsseldorf

2014 2-1 Incheon

2015 2-2 Düsseldorf

2015 3-2 Budapest