World Junior Championships Day 1 Review

Day 1 was a busy day for British Judo at the World Junior Championships in Marrakesh, Morocco with five of the seven strong team in action.

Paks European Junior Cup bronze medallist Joshua Giles (-60kg) had an opening round bye before defeating the silver medallist from Paks earlier this year, Andras Vida (HUN) in round 2. In round 3 Giles was defeated by the 2018 European Junior Championship silver medallist Konstantin Simeonidis (RUS).

Sian Bobrowska (-48kg) was also a bronze medallist from the Paks European Junior Cup, she defeated the current European Junior Champion, Irena Khubulova (RUS) in the opening round before being defeated by former World Cadet Championship bronze medallist Tugce Beder (TUR) in the second round.

European Junior Championship bronze medallist, Yasmin Javadian (-52kg) was defeated by world number 9 Martina Castagnola (ITA) in the second round after an opening round bye.

Jasmine Hacker-Jones (-52kg), making her World Junior Championship debut, had an opening round bye before being defeated by European Junior Championship bronze medallist Naomi Van Krevel (NED) in the second round.

Kaunas European Junior Cup bronze medallist Henry Wakes (-66kg) was defeated by the two time World Cadet Championship bronze medallist Narmandakh Bayanmunkh (MGL).

It isn’t until day 3, on Friday, that European Junior Champion Kelly Petersen-Pollard (-70kg) and European Junior Championship bronze medallist Lachlan Moorhead (-81kg) are in action.

Petersen-Pollard enters as the world number 1 seed and will be hoping to become Britain’s first World Junior Champion since Karina Bryant won gold in Cali in 1998. She has an opening round bye and will face the victor of the first-round match between Mina Agneta Ricken (GER) and Darja Piskunova (LTU).

Moorhead also has an opening round bye and will await the winner of the opening round match between Boris Shatveryan (ARM) and Giga Abuashvili (FRA)

Friday’s action from Marrakesh starts at 09:00am (GMT) with Final Block starting at 04:00pm (GMT). You can watch all the action on the British Judo homepage and follow all the results on the British Judo social media channels.