Egypt's Hisham Mesbah and Ramadan Darwish took two bronze medals in the World Judo Championship in Holland, Abeer Anwar reports In the under 90kg, Hisham Mesbah began in Pool A where he beat Timor Bolat from Kazakhstan then overcame Germany's Winston Gordon to lead the pool. In the repechage, Mesbah beat Slovakia's Milan Randl but lost to Korea's Kyu-Won Lee, winner of Pool B , in the semi-final, to collect the bronze. In the under 95kg Egypt's Ramadan Darwish in Pool B overcame Slovakia's Martin Janata, Kuwait's Abdullah Al-Otaibi and Germany's Peter Cousins but lost to Henk Grol of Holland. In the repechage round, Ramadan Darwish beat Mongolia's Temunlen Battulga and Elmar Gasimov from Azerbaijan to win the second bronze medal for Egypt. "It is a great success for all of us and for Egypt," Darwish said. "We have been absent for a long time in the World Championships medals standings. It was not an easy job to win the bronze medal. I played a number of tough matches but it ended successfully." Teddy Riner of France defended his heavyweight title after a lacklustre final in the over 100 kilos, which unfortunately ended a magnificent world championships in Rotterdam, the Netherlands . Riner, who surprisingly finished only third at the Beijing Olympics, took the most prized title from the 100-nation tournament, which saw the Japanese men fail to win a gold medal for the first time since the event began in 1956. In the final, the Frenchman met Oscar Bryson of Cuba, who in the semi-final had beaten Abdullo Tangriev of Uzbekistan, the conqueror of Riner in the Olympics. Neither fighter attacked with any persistency; both got first warnings for passivity and then three seconds from the end, Bryson got a second warning to give Riner the title. In the semi-final, Riner had defeated Marius Paskevicius of Lithuania, when he countered a haraigoshi. Paskevicius and Tangriev got the bronze medals. The women's heavyweight final was one- sided. Wen Tong of China, the defending world and Olympic over-78 kilos champion, quickly got the experienced Karina Bryant, a multiple world and European medallist, in trouble in newaza but the Briton eventually escaped. Tong, the only reigning Olympic champion either male or female to win a title in Holland, said, "I have achieved a lot in the sport but my goal is to prove it each time and to keep progressing, to become better and better. I felt comfortable with all my opponents. I want to defend my world title and so I attacked in each match. My ambition is now to win the Asian Games title in Guangzhou." The bronze medals in the over 78 kilos went to Idalis Ortiz Boucourt of Cuba and Maki Tsukada of Japan. "When Tomoko Fukumi won the gold medal on the first day, I was really happy for her," Tsukada said. "We went to the same high school. This made me want to win a medal myself but unfortunately I lost to Tong in my third bout. This is such a disappointment." She had also lost to the Chinese fighter in the Olympics and last two world championships "but I told myself never to give up and hang in there and so I got the bronze. Next year, the World Championships will be in Japan and I am determined to get my revenge there." In the under 100 kilos final, the local favourite Henk Grol, the Olympic bronze medallist, was thrown with a perfect seionage by Maxim Rakov of Kazakhstan. Rakov tucked himself under the Dutchman, who tried to block the movement by stretching out his right arm, only for Rakov to grab it, pull it under him and somersault Grol onto the mat for an ippon. Rakov said afterwards: "It was not difficult to fight the gold medal match against a Dutchman in The Netherlands. This was my revenge match. I lost against him before at the junior championships but this time I won." The pre-tournament favourite was Takamasa Anai of Japan, billed as the successor to the great Kosei Inoue, three-time winner of the title, after garnering the All-Japan title and the Grand Slam in Paris this year. However, Anai lost to Elmar Gasimov of Azerbaijan after missing with an ankle sweep and then being tumbled to the mat with a hand throw. Anai won one bronze medal, throwing Artem Bloshenko with a counter osotogake, while the other bronze went to Ramadan Darwish of Egypt.
