KARATE – EUROPEAN GAMES : AGHAYEV WINS THE SILVER MEDAL

Winner in 2015, Rafael Aghayev was ranked n°1 in the tournament (Busa was forfeited) and therefore targeted as the favorite. The Azerbaijani superbly held his rank to reach the final.

In the preliminary pool (2 athletes qualified out of 4), Aghayev defeated Kellaway (GB) 3-2 and Eltemur (Tur) 1-0, before ending with a draw (0-0) against Harpastaki, which offered him the 1st place of the group. In the 1/2 final, the five-time World champion beat Estonia’s Artamonov (2-1).

But he fell on a bone in the final against Ukraine’s Stanislav Horuna. The latter, winner in Rabat last April, surely remembered his defeat in the ½ final of the European championships at the end of March and worked accordingly to dominate his friend 4-0. Rafael Aghayev thus gets his 5th medal of the year, but no gold at the time.

In +84 kg, the World n°1 and reigning World champion Jonathan Horne was also the favorite of the event. But what we could guess in the preliminaries (two 0-0 against Lardy and Gurbanli and one win against Yamanoglu, 4-0) was confirmed in the ½ final. The German was not in a big day and lost on the wire (1-0) against Croatia’s Angjelo Kvesic, the twin brother of the -84 kg World champion. Jonathan Horne leaves Minsk with a bronze medal around his neck.

Podiums 2019

-60 kg

1. Kalnins (Lat)
2. Farzaliyev (Aze)
3. Plakhutin (Rus) and Crescenzo (Ita)

-67 kg

1. Maresca (Ita)
2. Hodzic (Mne)
3. Tadissi (Hun) and Krautsou (Blr)

-75 kg

1. Horuna (Ukr)
2. Aghayev (Aze)
3. Harspataki (Hun) and Artamonov (Est)

-84 kg

1. I. Kvesic (Cro)
2. Aktas (Tur)
3. Chobotar (Ukr) and Martina (Ita)

+84 kg

1. Gurbanli (Aze)
2. A. Kvesic (Cro)
3. Arkania (Geo) and Horne (Ger)

Kata H

1. Quintero (Spa)
2. Sofuoglu (Tur)
3. Heydarov (Aze) and Busato (Ita)

-68 kg

1. Semeraro (Ita)
2. Zaretska (Aze)
3. Melnyk (Ukr) and Quirici (Swi)

+68 kg

1. Palacio Gonzalez (Spa)
2. Hocaoglu (Tur)
3. Keinanen (Fin) and Chatziliadou (Gre)

Kata F

1. Sanchez Jaime (Spa)
2. Bottaro (Ita)
3. Esparteiro (Por) and Eltemur (Tur)

-50 kg

1. Plank (Aut)
2. Ozcelik (Tur)
3. Bouderbane (Fra) and Koulinkovitch (Blr)

-55 kg

1. Goranova (Bul)
2. Terliuga (Ukr)
3. Bitsch (Ger) and Warling (Lux)

-61 kg

1. Serogina (Ukr)
2. Ristic (Slo)
3. Coban (Tur) and Philippe (Fra