Asian Junior Judo Championships:
Banaeian settles for silver as Iran bags five medals
Mohammad-Pouria Banaeian settled for silver in the men’s +100kg class on Sunday as Iran collected five medals at the Asian Junior Judo Championships in Amman, Jordan.
The final-day results took Iran’s overall haul to nine medals across the two age categories in the Jordanian capital after the country had claimed four medals—including two golds—in the cadet competition last week.
Banaeian began his campaign with a victory over Kyrgyzstan’s Ilia Sukhinin before defeating Chinese Taipei’s Chen Hsing-Jen to advance to the final, where he lost to Uzbekistan’s Fazliddin Rafikov.
Elsewhere in the men’s competition, Sepehr Norouzi and Abolfazl Mohebbi shared bronze in the -90kg category.
Mahshid Safari, meanwhile, recovered from a quarterfinal defeat to eventual silver medalist Taibanganbi Chanu Khaidem of India to claim bronze in the women’s -70kg division after beating Uzbekistan’s Nigina Saparboeva.
Samira Khadem had opened Iran’s account on the penultimate day of the tournament by winning bronze in the women’s -63kg class.
The five-medal haul saw Iran finish seventh in the team standings.
Uzbekistan topped the table with 15 medals, including seven golds, while Kazakhstan and India finished second and third with six and one gold medals, respectively.
Mahsa Shakibaei and Sobhan Hakimi, Iran’s two cadet gold medalists in Amman, also targeted medals in the junior competition but finished empty-handed in their respective events.
Shakibaei, who made history by winning Iran’s first-ever women’s gold medal at continental showpiece, narrowly missed out on the podium in the -52kg event after losing to Uzbekistan’s Sabrina Azamatova in the bronze-medal contest.
Hakimi, meanwhile, endured a disappointing campaign in the men’s -81kg class, suffering a repechage defeat to Kyrgyzstan’s Nurmukhammed Muratov to finish seventh.
Hossein Novin (-81kg) and Amirreza Alizadeh (-90kg) had added two bronze medals to Iran’s tally in the cadet competition, helping the country finish third in the team standings behind Uzbekistan and Kazakhstan.