Wrestling World Championships:
Iran makes clean sweep of men’s team runner-up finishes
A total of five medals – including one gold – across 10 weight classes saw Iran stand second in the Greco-Roman competitions of the Wrestling World Championships in Belgrade.
Azerbaijan was crowned the champion, capturing double golds and three silvers to collect 120 points – 18 clear of Iran – with Turkey in third on 93 points.
The runner-up spot came after Iran’s freestyle squad had also finished on the second podium earlier in the Serbian capital with four medals.
On Sunday, reigning Olympic champion Mohammadreza Geraei brought the curtain down on a mediocre campaign for Iran by grabbing a consolation bronze in the 67kg contest.
Also a world gold medalist in 2021, Geraei bounced back from a technical-fall loss against Azerbaijan’s Hasrat Jafarov to edge out Hungarian Istvan Vancza 6-5 before outmuscling Armenia’s Slavik Galstyan 8-0 for a joint-third place alongside the host’s Mate Nemes, who had beaten the Iranian in last year’s final.
This was a third Greco-Roman bronze for Iran at the event, following Pouya Dadmarz (55kg) and Mohammad-Hadi Saravi (97kg).
Amin Mirzazadeh celebrated a first victory in three meetings with Turkish great Riza Kayaalp to take the 130kg gold, while Alireza Mohmadi fell to a 2-1 defeat against Rafig Huseynov of Azerbaijan in the 82kg final.
The two team runner-up finishes might go down as a decent outcome for the country but some of the results and performances would surely raise the alarm for Alireza Dabir, the chairman of the Iranian Wrestling Federation, as well as head coaches Pejman Dorostkar and Hassan Rangraz ahead of next year’s Paris Olympics.
Geraei was clearly far from his best, in part owing to a last-gasp weight loss before his first bout, as he ran away with shaky victories against minnow opponents before the last-eight humiliation against Jafarov.
The Iranian will be facing a daunting task in defending his Olympic crown in Paris as Cuban Luis Orta – a 60kg gold medalist in Tokyo – has emerged as the favorite to win the 67kg title after a statement world gold in a new weight category.
In the freestyle contests, meanwhile, Hassan Yazdani won a national-high ninth major medal – an 86kg silver – but again proved to be the second best against American David Taylor, suffering a fifth defeat in the sixth matchup with his familiar foe.
Numerous wrestling pundits have suggested that the Iranian sensation will have to come up with new tactics against Taylor if he fancies a second Olympic gold.
Rahman Amouzad also had a below-par run in Belgrade.
Ruthless Rahman stepped into the event as the defending champion but could only manage a berth for Paris after finishing fifth in the 65kg class, though he was the only Iranian wrestler to win a bout in eight freestyle encounters for the country against either an American or Russian oppositions.
For the meantime, Dabir and his coaches will be looking to build on gold-winning performances from Mirzazadeh and Amirhossein Zare’, who will head to Paris as the frontrunners for the superheavyweight top podiums.