Taekwondo

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  1. Katoussi and Marton win taekwondo goldspublished at 22:22 9 August 2024

    Firas Katoussi with gold medalImage source, Getty Images

    Tunisia's Firas Katoussi and Viviana Marton of Hungary picked up Paris 2024 taekwondo golds at the Grand Palais on Friday.

    Marton, the 18-year-old 12th seed, stunned third seed Aleksandra Perisic of Serbia 2-0 in straight rounds to take gold in the women's -67kg.

    The bronze medals were won by American Kristina Teachout and Sarah Chaari of Belgium.

    In the men's -80kg final, Katoussi made history by becoming his country's first Olympic champion in taekwondo by beating Iran's Mehran Barkhordari 2-0 in the gold-medal contest.

    Italy's Simone Alessio and Denmark's Edi Hrnic were the bronze medal winners in that category.

  2. Uzbekistan’s Rashitov retains taekwondo titlepublished at 21:28 8 August 2024

    Ulugbek RashitovImage source, Getty Images

    Uzbekistan’s Ulugbek Rashitov defended his Olympic men's -68kg taekwondo title with a decisive 2-0 win over Jordan’s Zaid Kareem who claimed silver.

    In the bronze-medal matches, Brazil's Edival Pontes defeated Spain's Javier Perez Polo 2-1 and China's Liang Yushuai was given a walkover after opponent Bradly Sinden of Great Britain withdrew with a knee injury.

    In the women's -57kg, South Korea's Kim Yujin took gold with a 2-0 win over Iran's Nahid Kiyanichandeh.

    Skylar Park of Canada won bronze, as did Bulgaria's Kimia Alizadeh.

    Alizadeh won bronze at Rio 2016 for Iran and also competed for the Refugee Olympic Team in Tokyo where she finished fifth.

    Great Britain's Jade Jones' bid for a third Olympic title was ended in the first round by Macedonia's Miljana Reljikj.

  3. Jones 'absolutely devastated' after shock Olympic exitpublished at 16:51 8 August 2024

    Media caption,

    Double Olympic gold medallist Jade Jones has spoke of her devastation after exiting the Paris Games in the first round of women's -57kg taekwondo.

    Jones was beaten by North Macedonia's Miljana Reljikj in a third round tie-breaker .

    The 31-year-old from Flint had set her sights on becoming the first three-time Olympic champion in the sport's history.

    "I’m absolutely devastated," she told BBC Sport Wales after the bout.

    "I clawed my way back to have this chance to be at my fourth Olympics, but it always comes down to the day and I didn’t have the balls and courage that it took today.

    "I’m really proud of myself for having the courage to try and do something that no one has done and it’s tough, it’s mentally tough, that’s why no one has done it before.

    "The more you win, the harder it gets, the more expectation and pressure. When you’re a kid you’ve got nothing to lose and you just fight.

    "I’m gutted for me, my coach, my family that I didn’t show what I’ve worked so hard for, didn’t show what I was capable of in my body and mind, but it’s sport and it’s life, I couldn’t do it."

    Jones' Olympic build-up had been overshadowed by the controversy of a missed drugs tests, but she was later cleared by the UK Anti-Doping Agency.

    "The preparation was tough, but I was really grateful they looked into it the way they did," she added.

    "The drug test came on dehydration day, I was losing the weight and kind of not in the right frame of mind.

    "I got confused with it all, so I’m just so lucky that they looked into it and saw nothing was wrong and it all got sorted. It was stressful."

  4. Wongpattanakit retains Olympic taekwondo crownpublished at 21:53 7 August 2024

    Panipak Wongpattanakit celebratesImage source, Getty Images

    Thailand's Panipak Wongpattanakit beat China's Guo Qing 2-1 in an enthralling encounter to seal gold in the women's taekwondo -49kg weight class.

    Wongpattanakit, who won bronze in 2016 and gold in 2020, picked up the opening round but Guo struck back to take the second.

    After two successful video appeals, Wongpattanakit was awarded six points for landing head kicks and came through the third to defend her title.

    The bronze medals went to Croatia's Lena Stojkovic and Mobina Nematzadeh of Iran.

    It was also gold for Park Tae-joon of South Korea in the men's -58kg category with victory against Azerbaijan's Gashim Magomedov, who had to withdraw because of injury in round two.

    Park, 20, who is the reigning world champion in the lighter -54kg class, beat Tokyo Olympic bronze medallist Jang Jun to book his spot in Paris - and he made full use of his opportunity.

    Tunisia's Mohamed Khalil Jendoubi and France's Cyrian Ravet won bronze medals.