Men’s Flyweight -58kg
Despite him arguably not being the strong South Korean fighter in recent years, Park Tae-joon (South Korea) relatively cruised through this field. He only had one bout where he needed three rounds, against Cyrian Ravet (France). On the other side of the draw it was Gashim Magomedov (Azerbaijan) who came through. He blitzed through Vito Dell’Aquila (Italy), who did then withdraw from injury leaving Ravet with a bronze. Magomedov was also suffering and struggled to launch any attacks in the final because of a leg injury. The other bronze medal matchup saw the top two seeds clash. Despite conceding the first point, Mohamed Khalil Jendoubi (Tunisia) was able to rout Adrian Vicente (Spain) only conceding four points and scoring twenty-three in the two rounds.
🥇Park Tae-joon 🇰🇷
🥈Gashim Magomedov 🇦🇿
🥉Cyrian Ravet 🇫🇷
🥉Mohamed Khalil Jendoubi 🇹🇳
My original draft saw this going to Korea in the form of Jang Jun. As referenced, once the participant was confirmed as Park Tae-joon I changed that. His lack of form came to some extent due to not competing in major events as Jun was stronger. The fact he beat Jun should have been a clue to his form.
Men’s Featherweight -68kg
Most people seemed to expect a final between Ulugbek Rashitov (Uzbekistan) and Bradly Sniden (Great Britain). Instead Rashitov relatively cruised through, winning all his bouts in two rounds to become a two-time Olympic champion at 22. Sniden cruised through his opening fight but was taken into a third round by Marko Golubic(Croatia). He would lose to Zaid Kareem (Jordan) in the following round, visibly hampered and only scoring two in each of the three rounds before pulling out of his bronze-medal matchup. Edival Pontes (Brazil), who pushed Kareem to three rounds, would take bronze, defeating Javier Perez (Spain) over three tight rounds.
🥇Ulugbek Rashitov 🇺🇿
🥈Zaid Kareem 🇯🇴
🥉Edival Pontes 🇧🇷
🥉Liang Yushuai 🇨🇳
Sniden being injured cannot have helped. I mentioned Kareem as a potential medalists.
Men’s Welterweight -80kg
The biggest upset in the opening round saw Edi Hrnic (Denmark) beat Seif Eissa (Egypt) holding him scoreless in the second round. Henrique Marques (Brazil) beat Saleh Al-Sharabaty (Jordan). In the quarter finals, Mehran Barkhordari (Iran) upset Simone Alessio (Italy) in an enthralling bout. He was 9-8 down in the third round, coming back to win 10-9. In the semi finals Barkhordari had to come from behind again, winning high-scoring second and third rounds. The other semi was the opposite with four points being score in two even rounds. It was Firas Katoussi (Tunisia) who beat Carl Nickolas (United States). In the final, it was again low-scoring and suiting Katoussi, he came out on top. Hrnic would have two high-scoring bouts to win bronze whilst in a battle between the top-two seeds it was Alessio who came out on top.
🥇Firas Katoussi 🇹🇳
🥈Mehran Barkhordari 🇮🇷
🥉Edi Hrnic 🇩🇰
🥉Simone Alessio 🇮🇹
I mentioned the strong African representation and one of them took a win.
Men’s Heavyweight +80kg
It was a surprise final in the heavyweight division. 21-year-old Caden Cunningham (Great Britain) took on 20-year-old Arian Salimi (Iran). Cunningham won the first round but Salimi took over, with his kicks helping him to win the following two rounds. Cunningham had beat former Olympic medalists Abdoul Issoufou (Niger), Rafael Alba(Cuba) and Cheick Sallah Cisse (Ivory Coast) to reach the final. Salimi beat Nikita Rafalovich (Uzbekistan) before coming from a round down against Carlos Sansores (Mexico) and Ivan Sapina (Croatia). Alba dominated Sapina to win another bronze whilst Cisse edged a back-and-forth contest with Sansores to take another medal.
🥇Arian Salimi 🇮🇷
🥈Caden Cunningham 🇬🇧
🥉Cheick Sallah Cisse 🇨🇮
🥉Rafael Alba 🇨🇺
I was not far off here, Salimi was the one I missed
Women’s Flyweight -49kg
Panipak Wongpattanakit (Thailand) cruised through to the final, with relatively one-sided bouts. Lena Stojkovic(Croatia) troubled her the most, in the semi final, losing two rounds to zero and only scoring five to the nineteen of Wontpattanakit. The bottom half of the draw saw upsets in the quarter finals as Adriana Cerezo (Spain) and Merve Dincel (Turkey) scored a combined five points when losing to Mobina Nematzadeh (Iran) and Guo Qing (China). Qing won in two rounds to reach the final. In the final Wongpattanakit would take the opening round but Qing fought back. A tense final round saw the Thai fighter win 6-2 to win her second consecutive gold medal before retiring.
🥇Panipak Wongpattanakit 🇹🇭
🥈Guo Qing 🇨🇳
🥉Mobina Nematzadeh 🇮🇷
🥉Lena Stojkovic 🇭🇷
I tried to go for an outsider to beat Wongpattanakit but it wasn’t to be. I mentioned Stojkovic’s ability without translating it into top level wins.
Women’s Featherweight -57kg
The expectation heading into the tournament was that we would see Jade Jones (Great Britain) vs Luo Zongshi(China) in the final. Neither of them made it. Instead the story was Kim Yu-jin (South Korea) who beat four of the top five to take gold. The one she did not beat was Jones who was eliminated in the first round by Miljana Reljik (North Macedonia) based on registered hits. The bout of the day arguably came in the first round which saw 42 points scored over three rounds between Kimia Alizadeh (Bulgaria) and Nahid Kiani (Iran), who came back from a round down. Kiani was the loser in the final, only able to score one point. The bronze medal matchups were quite low scoring. Skylar Park (Canada) beat Laetitia Aoun (Lebanon) scoring four points to her two. Alizadeh was held to zero points in the opening two rounds but still got the win over Zongshi to take the other bronze.
🥇Kim Yu-jin 🇰🇷
🥈Nahid Kiani 🇮🇷
🥉Skylar Park 🇨🇦
🥉Kimia Alizadeh 🇧🇬
Prediction analysis; 1 medalists correct
Did anyone pick both Zongshi and Jones missing a medal?
Women’s Middleweight -67kg
The top quarter was blown apart as seeded Magda Wiet-Henin (France) and Ruth Gbagbi (Ivory Coast) lost to Kristina Teachout (United States) and Viviana Marton (Hungary) in the first round. In the quarter-final between the aforementioned there was 59 points scored, the majority by Marton who took the win. Sarah Chaari (Belgium), the number one seed, would be the opposition in the semi-final, having only conceded four points in the opening two matches. It was a close semi-final but Marton won going away. In the bottom half, Song Jie (China) upset Julyana Al-Sadeq (Jordan) in a low-scoring contest. It was Aleksandra Perisic (Serbia) who went through to the final. A body kick sealed the win for Marton in two rounds. Chaari would show her class in the bronze-medal matchup, coming back to win after losing the first-round by fourteen.
🥇Viviana Marton 🇭🇺
🥈Aleksandra Perisic 🇷🇸
🥉Sarah Chaari 🇧🇪
🥉Kristina Teachout 🇺🇸
I don’t think I’d have picked Wiet-Henin to medal not at home but at home I thought she would do enough to medal. It is possibly a sport that has less of an advantage to home support
Women’s Heavyweight +67kg
The top seven seeds all made it through the round of sixteen which led for some intriguing matchups at that stage in the quarter-finals. Nafia Kus (Turkey) edged through her quarter final after losing two rounds, despite only scoring one point in the rounds she won. The only top four seed to be eliminated was Rebecca McGowan (Great Britain) who went out to Svetlana Osipova (Uzbekistan). Osipova was not as offensively potent in the semi-final but still beat Lee Da-bin (South Korea) to make the final. Kus was then defeated in a low-scoring contest in the semi-final against Althea Laurin (France) four points to three. The final saw Laurin take the first round. She was down in the second round entering the closing seconds but landed a head-kick to tie it up and win the decision based on superiority.
🥇Althea Laurin 🇫🇷
🥈Svetlana Osipova 🇺🇿
🥉Lee Da-bin 🇰🇷
🥉Nafia Kus 🇹🇷
The four medalists came from the six I mentioned as major contenders. It was a different final that I predicted, based on the recent form
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