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| Sam
Ingram wins Paralympic Bronze |
Prodigious talent Sam Ingram won a bronze medal in judo's under-90kg
category, saving Britain's medal hopes after under-100kg favourite
Ian Rose went out in the first round.
Ingram's Paralympic bronze on his Games debut follows his 007 world
silver medal.
Ingram said: "It feels good. This morning I wanted to go for
gold but I couldn't beat the Frenchman. Bronze is still bronze."
The 23-year-old performed strongly throughout the afternoon's matches,
despite a rocky start to the day.
In a controversial opening match Ingram had an ippon overturned.
With just 28 seconds of his first match to go, Ingram appeared to
throw France's Olivier de Cugnon de Sevricourt cleanly for an expected
ippon.
He punched the air to celebrate and the ippon was duly awarded to
the young British judoka. But after the technical official intervened
Ingram's points were removed and the bout resumed. The eventual
score finished with the Frenchman finishing a yuko up on Ingram.
Luckily Ingram qualified for the repechage where he dispatched Japan's
Yusuke Hatsuse with a win by ippon. He went on to beat German judoka
Sebastian Junk in the repechage final to qualify for the bronze
medal match. Ingram was automatically awarded the bronze by an ippon
decision after Algeria's Messaoud Nine withdraw from the competition.
Britain's gold medal hope Ian Rose was less fortunate, losing his
opening match to Haruka Hirose from Japan 1-2. In accordance with
judo's rules, Hirose's subsequent loss then sent Rose home.
"I am gutted,” Rose said. "Losing your first fight is
always a bad way to go because you're then relying on the guy who
beat you to win his next fight and take you into the repechage."
"I was feeling good and my preparations have gone well. My
judo was OK but the Japanese fighter defended a lot."
Rose was hoping to add a gold to his 2004 over-100kg silver and
1996 under-86kg bronze medals. But he has not given up his ambition
of that elusive colour: "I've been here before and I'll be
back. London 2012 is definitely the goal.”
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