World Junior Wushu Championships:
Final-day heroics as Iran seals sanda crown
Iran claimed the sanda title at the World Junior Wushu Championships in Bandar Seri Begawan, Brunei, thanks to a remarkable haul of seven gold medals and three silvers.
The country still had to settle for the fourth place in the overall standings – comprising sanda and talou competitions – with 23 medals, finishing behind China, Indonesia, and Malaysia, which bagged the same number of golds as Iran – nine – but stood third with more silvers.
Iranian boys and girls stole the show on the final day of the competitions by collecting five golds and double silvers across different weight and age classes.
Abolfazl Asadi defeated China’s Jinghua Liu for the boys’ junior 65kg gold, while Amirhesam Mohammadi came out on top against Indonesian Genea Elyos Silaban to win the ultimate prize in the 52kg contests.
Meanwhile, Yekta Adbi, Saghar Hosseinzadeh, and Diana Rahimi were all victorious against Chinese opponents in their respective final showpieces, as Iran made a clean sweep of sanda golds in the girls’ contests.
Adibi beat Jiaqi Lou in the junior 52kg final, with Hosseinzadeh outmuscling Baijin Yang for the 56kg prize, before Rahimi brought the curtain down on a perfect run for the Iranian girls with a victory over Miaoqi Ma in the 60kg final.
Elsewhere, Alireza Zamani settled for a silver in the children’s 48kg contests after a final loss to Indian Shaurya.
Soroush Haji Mash’hadi also finished his campaign with a silver medal, suffering a final defeat against China’s Fengjian Zhang in the junior 70kg final.
In the talou events, Sana Panahi won her second silver medal at this year’s event when she scored 8.470 points to finish runner-up to the American opponent in the nanquan contest.
Ramtin Siahmoshtei and Sana Chak were the most productive Iranians in the talou competitions, grabbing a gold, a silver, and a bronze medal apiece, while Arsham Khalilpour also enjoyed a decent campaign with a silver and a bronze medal.