Wrestling U20 World Championships:
Ma’soumi, Rezaei collect golds but Iran finishes freestyle runner-up
Amirreza Ma’soumi and Ali Rezaei won double gold medals on the final day of the Wrestling U20 World Championships in Pontevedra, Spain, but Iran missed out on the freestyle team title for the first time since 2019, settling for the runner-up place behind Team USA.
Elsewhere on Sunday, Ebrahim Khari suffered a technical fall against Japanese Masanosuke Ono in the 61kg final, while Abolfazl Rahmani defeated Italian Gabriele Niccolini 9-2 for a consolation bronze in the 86kg contests, as the Iranian 10-man squad tallied 160 points thanks to three golds and bronzes apiece as well as one silver.
Ali Khorrmdel had walked away with the ultimate prize of the 65kg event on the preceding night, courtesy of a 10-2 victory Makoto Hosokawa of Japan, with Ali Karampour (70kg) and Mahdi Yousefi (79kg) finishing their campaigns with two bronze medals in their respective classes.
The Americans won a single gold, through Luke Lilledahl (57kg), across 10 weight classes – plus four silver and bronze medals apiece – but still managed to claim the team title with 175 points.
Four medals, including double golds, saw Japan finish third with 90 points.
Ma’soumi retains dominance
Ma’soumi might be behind fellow-Iranian Amirhossein Zare’ in the pecking order for the 125kg spot of the senior national team, but the superheavyweight prodigy again proved to be in a league of his own when it comes to age-group world championships.
Standing between Ma’soumi and a third world under-20 title in the 125kg final was American Benjamin Kueter, who won the 97kg gold in the event in 2022.
Having conceded a single point on his way to the final, Ma’soumi took a 4-0 lead with a takedown, a point for Kueter’s passivity and a stepout, before the American caught the deficit to two in the final 30 second, though it was too little two late as the Iranian teenager bagged a fifth world age-group gold in three years.
“My opponent in the final is a high-profile wrestler as he won the world gold two years ago,” Ma’soumi said. “He had taken a year off from wrestling but had improved a lot since then. He’s a skilled and accomplished wrestler. Thank God I was able to use my knowledge of him to wrestle smartly and win.”
While he won his four bouts outscoring his opponents 32-3, Ma’soumi had only one technical superiority win. In 2022, when he won both the U20 and U23 world titles, he won all but one of his matches via superiority.
“I had an injury in my hand and it was broken, so I tried to be careful with it,” he said. “Otherwise, I’m always aggressive and a fighter.”
Ma’soumi insisted he remains fixated on making the Iranian senior team.
“In the match against Amirhossein Zare’ in Croatia, I lost,” he said of his 5-0 loss to the Olympic silver medalist in January’s Ranking Series event in Zagreb. “Some might say that I have settled, but no, I’m not satisfied at all. I’m preparing myself for the World Championships in Zagreb, aiming for the national team selection.”
Earlier on Sunday, Rezaei came from behind to beat American Ladarion Lockett – a world U17 champion last year – on criteria in a thrilling showdown, becoming the first world U20 champion from Iran in the 74kg class in 15 years.
Lockett was leading the final 3-1 after scoring a takedown in the second period and Rezaei, who won a silver medal last year, needed at least a takedown to win.
It came in the fifth minute of the bout when Lockett missed a sweep single and Rezaei showed exceptional speed to get him a bodylock and finish with a takedown.
Last year, Rezaei dropped the 70kg final against American Meyer Shapiro 11-6 and was desperate to make up for the setback this time around.
“I’ve been waiting for this moment for about a year and a half, and thankfully, in the final, my opponent was again an American, and I managed to beat him. This journey continues.”
The freestyle runner-up finish came after the Iranian 10-man squad had dominated the Greco-Roman competitions last week.
Ali Ahmadi Vafa (55kg), Mohammad-Mahdi Gholampour (60kg), Ahmadreza Mohsennejad (67kg), and Alireza Abdevali (77kg) pocketed four golds, while Abolfazl Fat’hi took the 130kg silver and Erfan Jarkani won a 63kg bronze, as Iran tallied 147 points for a fifth world under-20 title in a row, with Kazakhstan (100pts) and Turkey (98pts) in the following spots.