phelps

man, this is just unbelievable...the Polish girl in the -55kg won her semifinal against Yamada (JPN) at the Hantei (judges' decision)... I'd have never thought something like this could happen... better for Italy... however, it was 2 minutes of nothing...I don't really know how could Cardin lose against this girl (with all respect for her)...

yess...Crescenzo (men's -60kg) won against the always dangerous Firzaliyev of AZE and now he's in the pool semifinals... meanwhile the bout of this class between Medhizadeh (IRI) and Samdan (TUR) started...unfortunately it doesn't have any tv coverage...

to be noticed how Russia were almost not existing in Karate until it didn't become an Olympic Sport... now they're improving fast and furious and they're altready getting better results than ever before...

Jana Bitsch vs Valeriia Alekhina and Sara Yamada vs Dorota Banaszczyk are the women's -55kg semifinals... we need a miracle from the Polish girl, but frankly I'm hopeless...

oh, boy...this is painful (and shameful)...Sara Cardin (women's -55kg) lost the pool final against an unknow Polish girl... so, probably she won't even make the repechage bracket...

well, if you look at Yin's route to the final, you could even be a little optimistic... the repechage bracket on her side is LAT vs POL, the winner vs MAR, then comes Alipour...and if she wins her repechage bout, then she's in the Bronze Medal match vs Pasqua (ITA), who's at her 1st international medal round since 2015 Serie A meet in Salzburg (and she only won a world bronze in 2014, then nothing anymore)... by the way, today's we're having a lot of surprises...much more than yesterday...

it looks that today we're going better than yesterday...and finally some Kumite medals (or at least some chances for those) would eventually come... Busà is always our superstar (he won his 1st world title in 2006 and still managed to make the final 12 years after, with many other medals -in total, 2 gold, 2 silver and 1 bronze at the world champs and 3-2-5 at the Europeans...counting only the individual stuff- in between these 2, of course), but if the live blog is not wrong -anything else has stopped working here...but I think it's more about my internet broadband connection that's not performing as it's supposed to do- also Laura Pasqua has surprisingly won her pool and has reached the semifinals...

maybe the Olympic Channel?

interesting to know that they started women's program... maybe one day they will be as good as the men are nowadays..

but the problem for Iran is that (in)famous blacklist of doping cases recorded between 2008 and now...and, if I remember well, Iran is one of those Countries that will be allowed to enter only 1 male athlete in Tokyo (and 1 female, but we all know that there are no female weightliftewrs from Iran ion the international scene)... if that's the case, I think they already decided to count on the 96kg class and Moradi (who's an almost safe Gold)...

p.s. Aghayev won his 1st bout against a guy from GUA only at the Hantei (judges' decision) after a 0-0 score!

Matias Rodriguez Fuentes! the Chilean did throw Noah Bitsch out and now he's in the pool final! that's a big surprise... unfortunately he's in the same pool of Rafael Aghayev, which means he doesn't have many chance to reach the semis, but still this is a great result for him (and losing vs Aghayev very often means in any case having many chance to make the bronze medal repechage bracket)...

by the way, he lost only 1-2 against Busà (ITA)... not sure this is good in our perspective... p.s. also the Iranian Asgari won his bout against the always problematic Kazakh guy... so far, only the US man went unexpectedly out among the favourites (and Horuna, but he faced another big name of this class, so one of the 2 had to go home early)...

I think WKF has to review something about Espoir Ntungane of Rwanda...the photo associated to his profile in the live blog I fear is not the right one...

and the first big, very big surprise of the day is Thomas Scott (USA) being thrown out by Aziz Ismail (MKD) in the men's -75kg... meanwhile in one of the most inetresting bouts so far, Noah Bitsch (GER) eliminated Stanislav Horuna (UKR)...

Saturday morning @ about 10.30 a.m. (if you need some free streaming, look at page 1 or 2 in this thread, where the link to PMG Sport is posted )...

@hckosice Miroslava Kopunova is in the Bronze Medal match!!! today is a great day for Slovak Combat Sports...

Today's action recap... Men's Individual Kata Gold Medal Match: Damian Hugo Quintero Capdevila vs Ryo Kiyuna Bronze Medal Match #1: Antonio Diaz vs Alì Sofuoglu Bronze Medal Match #2: Ilja Smorguner vs Mattia Busato Women's Individual Kata Gold Medal Match: Sandra Sanchez Jaime vs Kiyou Shimizu Bronze Medal Match #1: Grace Lau Mo Sheung vs Maria Dimitrova Bronze Medal Match #2: Viviana Bottaro vs Alexandra Feracci Men's Individual Kumite, +84kg Gold Medal Match: Jonathan Horne vs Sajad Ganjzadeh Bronze Medal Match #1: Babacar Seck Sakho vs Filipe Reis Bronze Medal Match #2: Alexander Pshenitsyn vs Alparslan Yamanoglu Women's Individual Kumite, +68kg Gold Medal Match: Eleni Chatziliadou vs Ayumi Uekusa Bronze Medal Match #1: Shymaa Abouel Yazed vs Ramona Bruederlin Bronze Medal Match #2: Anne Laure Florentin vs Hana Antunovic Men's Individual Kumite, -84kg Gold Medal Match: Valerii Chobotar vs Ivan Kvesic Bronze Medal Match #1: Daniyar Yuldashev vs Zabiollah Poorshab Bronze Medal Match #2: Ugur Aktas vs Anton Isakau Women's Individual Kumite, -68kg Gold Medal Match: Victoria Isaeva vs Irina Zaretska Bronze Medal Match #1: Maryia Aliakseyeva vs Lamya Matoub Bronze Medal Match #2: Halyna Melnyk vs Miroslava Kopunova

that's Karate...actually, that's Kumite...on a given day, anything can happen... p.s. rankings are not so important, as many Countries don't take part in most of the tournaments throughout the season and show up only at the global events...

and the disaster for Italy is now complete...also Silvia Semeraro (women's -68kg) is out in an early round after losing to an unknown Norwegian... in just an afternoon we probably have already compromised our chances to qualify an athelte to both the heavyweight classes in Tokyo...these championships are already highly disappointing, even if tomorrow we put 4 people in the gold medal matches (which won't happen, in any case)... when it really matters, Italy fail...that's obvious...

actually it was Chobotar (UKR) who took care of Poorshab... but as he went on winning and he's through to the Gold Medal match, Poorshab will have a chance to win a consolation Bronze...

yes, that's exactly what they did... do you trust more a real trial court or those boiled idiots who can't have a normal job as lawyers and/or judges and find a place in the socalled sports justice thanks to some political recommendation? I have no doubt...regular justice is far from being perfect in Italy, but for sure is way better than those bunch of...you know what I mean... p.s. however, it's still the 1st degree of judgment...there's a long way to go before the word "end" can be put on this story...

on the Italian press they say he had diabetis...and he went to a croissaint's eaters contest... probably he died because of a glycemic peak... he was a genius, I guess...

quite...but not just... Tatarova lost at the Hantei (judges' decision) to Florentin, who's now in the semifinal (and ITA and SVK have to hope she's gonna get to the final, too to keep their hopes alive)... sorry @hckosice...

and Ganjzadeh is the first to make the Gold Medal match...he just destroyed the Russian (what a wasted chance for Marino)...