Renshall 7th at World Championships

On the 4^th day of the IJF World Championships, Lucy Renshall (SKK JC; Pete Blood) recorded her best finish at a senior World Championships with a 7^th place finish.

Renshall was competing for the first time as world number one; and the first time since the European Championships in April following a shoulder injury that also ruled her out of the Commonwealth Games.

Following an opening round bye, Renshall dominated her opening two contests defeating Amina Belkadi (ALG) in Round 2 and 2022 European Youth Olympic Festival Champion Kerem Primo (ISR). Both victories came as Renshall’s opponents picked up three penalty shidos.

Renshall then faced 2022 Tel Aviv and Hungary Grand Slam champion Meguim Horikawa (JPN) in the Quarter-Finals.

Renshall found herself with two shidos to Horikawa’s one when the Japanese judoka registered a waza-ari score with 90-seconds of the contest remaining. Renshall battled to even the score but unfortunately ran out of time. The defeat saw Renshall progress to the Repechage.

Renshall faced Angela Szymanska (POL) for a place in the bronze medal contest, the pair had met on two previous occasions with the score at one victory each – the last contest coming at the 2022 Paris Grand Slam where Szymanska defeated Renshall in the bronze medal contest.

There was nothing between the pair before Szymanska registered a waza-ari score with 90-seconds of the contest remaining and transitioned into an osaekomi hold down to record an ippon score to progress to the bronze medal contest.

The defeat meant Renshall had to settle for 7^th.

Also in action today was Lachlan Moorhead (Sheffield JC; Matt Moorhead) who was making his World Championship debut.

The Commonwealth Games champion defeated Eljan Hajiyev (AZE) in the opening round. Moorhead registered a seoi-otoshi for waza-ari score as the contest entered the final 60-seconds before a second waza-ari in the final 20-seconds booked his place in Round 2 to face defending World Champion Matthias Casse (BEL).

Moorhead defended well against Casse and forced the contest to Golden Score, but the experience of the Olympic bronze medallist saw him register an ippon score to progress. The result does see Moorhead gain 200 world ranking points towards Paris Olympic qualification.

Yesterday saw Acelya Toprak (Darren Hawney & Fitzroy Davies; Metro Judo Club & Relentless Judo) defeated in her opening round contest against Pauline Starke (GER). A change of direction in the final 30-seconds of the contest saw Starke register an ippon score.

Tomorrow will see Kelly Petersen-Pollard (Hardy Spicer 83; Fitzroy Davies) make her senior World Championship debut alongside Jemima Yeats-Brown (Ryecroft; Ian Oliver) in the -70kg category.

8^th seed Petersen-Pollard will face either Gulnoza Matniyazova (UZB) or Chantal Wright (USA) in Round 2 following an opening-round bye whilst Yeats-Brown has been drawn in Pool C and will face Nigara Shaheen (IRT) in the opening round.

Preliminary Round action starts at 6:00am with Final Block commencing at 13:00.

You can watch all the action from the World Championships LIVE at live.ijf.org each day.

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