European Cadet Championships 2002

The British Judo Association Boys Cadet Team recently returned from the 2^nd European Cadet Championships in Gyor – Hungary, 29^th/30^th June 2002. These Championships along with the European Youth Olympic Days are our most prestigious events and gives our players the opportunity to compete against the very best players of their ages in Europe. This tournament was no different with – 44 European Countries being represented by nearly 400 Players, Boys & Girls in their respective weight categories. Our team of 7 Boys competing in the 8 weight groups were:

Our preparations went well with, Training Camps in Kendal & Paris, even though we had a couple of late changes – the venue from Andorra to Hungary and the date being brought forward from July to June along with our perpetual problem of GCSE examinations the travel to Hungary went well with the boys looking relaxed and confident.

On our arrival in Gyor our initial accreditation with the EJU officials went well – but then, when the local people

took over, it took nearly 3 hours extra to finalise all our paperwork, before we could leave for our hotel.

Today we had four players competing, we left the hotel at 6:00am, in good time to travel to the official Rada Hotel for the weigh-in.

This our opening match for the team was against Tonoyan – Armenia – it was a tough start for Ashley, but he won well by Chui & a yuko, second up was Janssens – Belgium, again he went through by a Shido, another hard worked win. For a place in the semi-final, he was drawn against an extremely strong player

Maximciuc – Moldova, which he went on to loose by Ippon. In the Repechage he had another eastern European Mitev – Bulgaria,

As before Ashley worked hard to defeat his opponent by Yuko & Shido. Zanitarya – UKR, was next , another physically demanding fight which went to the ‘Golden Score’ when Ashley lost by a Yuko. Ashley’s overall performance in this his first major International was excellent, his results gave him a creditable 7^th place and showed he has all the attributes to progress into a fine junior/senior player.

Over the last two years, Lee’s has produced some of the best judo from any player in his age group in Europe and was a serious contender for a medal at this event. His first match, Pinto – Portugal, didn’t last long with Lee throwing with his ‘Latts’ for ippon, next up was Draksic – Slovenia, it was a physical contest with the Slovenian, coming out on top by a Shido. In the Repechage he was up against Philip Dahn – German, Dahn had been watching Lee closely, keeping well out of the way of Lees attacks, taking a penalty initially and as time ran out a Yuko to take the match.

Although he worked and fought hard, on this occasion his favoured technique didn’t quite work against this level of opposition.

His first opponent was the Belgium – Leeman’s, it was a hard match – Joe tried but Leeman’s went through on the strength of a Shido. Joe had a long wait to see if he could go further, but the Belgium went out easily to the Latvian – Magers by ippon which put Joe out. Joes tournament ended before it really began, he never really got going, I was quite disappointed with his performance as I know he is a very talented player – at the Training Camp which followed the competition his performances before his sustained an injury was excellent – but two days too late!

Julian had had a hard fought series of contests against Tom Reed all over Europe trying to qualify his place in this Championship, he did so taking 3 Gold medals two against Tom and one in the French Cadet Tournament, in his last three contests.

Kornmueller – Austria, was Julian’s first opponent, he cruised through with a wazari & ippon, next up was Di’Cristo – Italy an extremely abrasive and fiery character, hard to throw, it was a tremendous contest with Julian taking the match, 3 Yuko’s and a Koka to a penalty. Kuzmin – Ukraine was next, again another difficult opponent , whom Julian threw for a perfect ippon. To qualify for the final he had the Romanian – Salinceau, who had had three ippon wins previously, the match was tense going to the golden score, when Julian exploded under the Romanian to finish with a good ippon. Waiting for Julian in the final was Rasulov – Russia, a good 8 to 10 inches taller than Julian, although he worked hard and attacked constantly, Rasulov was just too strong and took the Gold by 3Yuko’s & Shido to a Shido. Julian worked hard this and all his match’s, without doubt it was his best performance for well over a year, the Russian in the final was just a better player, stronger and with a wider range of technique. Julian can only progress from here and hopefully develop into a player of the future.

The boys performance on Saturday was a tremendous fillip for our three players today, each one of them easily made their appropriate weight, we arrived early at the centre, had a good warm-up and prepared for what was to come.

Daniel had a difficult qualification for this event, finally gaining the spot, when James Gilmore suffered an injury, he set off with a terrific ippon against Arnautov – Moldovia, next was Randl – Slovakia; this match was a hard fought dour affair with Daniel taking it with a Yuko & Shido to a Koka & Shido. To achieve a place in the semi-final Daniel had Kiptsevich – Belarus, he worked hard but his opponent was hard & strong, and he was thrown for ippon. For his first Repechage contest Daniel had a Dane – Iburg, he fought well throwing his Danish opponent for a superb Uchi-mata for ippon, looking confident he moved onto Prieto – Spain, another very hard match, it could have gone either way but after a momentary lack of concentration by Daniel, disaster struck and he was tipped over and lost by ippon. Again this was Daniel’s first attempt at a major tournament

He fought well, demonstrating some fine throwing skills and technical judo, the 7^th place in this Europeans will give him the impetus to move further along in junior/senior Judo.

** It is interesting to note that at the EYOD’s in Spain last year Iliadis was competing for Georgia and took the Gold their also at U73kg

It will be interesting to see how this young man does in the Junior Worlds in Korea, later in the year.

Jayson had the misfortune to be drawn against the Georgian – Gauashelishuu (eventual winner) he did fight well and lost by being countered twice for wazari, it isn’t often that our players meet boys with this style of judo and it is important that we achieve regular constructive practices against quality players of this type. Jayson’s next match in the repecharge was Silva – Portugal, he made a mistake and paid the ultimate penalty by being held down for ippon, which ended his tournament.

Joe was our last player in the tournament, As is normal – we have fewer and fewer heavyweights participating at this and most other International Events. Joe had Crocz – Poland, in his first round, although tiny compared with most of his contempories, he was going well, but stood still giving Crocz an opportunity to throw Joe for ippon, which he did. Unfortunately for Joe, Crocz’s next opponent Meckovskis – Moldovia, easily defeated the Polish boy – putting Joe out.

Again as is the norm, the medal table was topped by the Russian Boys, with Azerbaijan and Georgia in the top four – the remaining Golds going to Hungary the host nation and Greece, via the Georgian exile Iliadis, with the Great Britain Team coming Joint 7^th with a Silver medal & 2/7^th places.

On the whole our team performed and fought to their limits, with the majority of boys doing well, our heavyweights though, failed to achieve their full potential and I feel they could have performed better than they did, this is partly due to the lack of serious opposition within Great Britain and is shown up through all levels of judo Junior/Cadet & Senior. This is a definite problem weight category for Great Britain and urgently needs to be addressed by the BJA if we are ever to produce another Heavyweight of the calibre of Elvis Gordon.

This is the 3^rd Major tournament – European Championships in Romania 2000; European Youth Olympic Days in Murcia - Spain 2001 and now the European Championships in Gyor Hungary 2002, where the medal table has been totally dominated by Russia; Azerbaijan and Georgia, this reflects the situation within Europe at both Junior & Senior levels.

It is vitally important that monies are found immediately by the BJA to enable our young players to travel to and compete with Eastern European Countries or else we shall suffer the problem of becoming a 2^nd Division Country. The Cadet Squad of Great Britain has maintained its status as the No.1 Country outside the above 3 Countries mentioned, in Europe, which must be a testimony to the efforts of our players, their parents, their Club Coach’s and the structure used by our Cadet Squad.

There were the usual problem of the age of some of the competitors, two boys from Azerbaijan, were not allowed to participate, because they were found to be too old and several players certainly looked not just U17 but would have struggled to make U25.

After the competition there was a 3 day Training Camp with many of the teams staying to participate, this gave our players an ideal opportunity to immediately get to grips with the Eastern Europeans. The lightweight Russian boys were excellent, very skilful and tremendous fighters, they were driven on by their coach’s which made the training sessions even more competitive.

One of the major pluses of International Training Camps apart from the obvious, quality judo, training with different boys and different styles is that our boys have an opportunity to make friends with players they wouldn’t normally meet to socialise and to enjoy each others company.

The Camp went well, the boys practised hard with every one there, a great deal of effort and spirit was shown by the team and I’m sure that they all learned a great deal from the experience of the Competition and the Camp.

The boys conduct was good we had no disciplinary problems and just minor injuries, which were looked after by our phyiso - Diane Henderson, who worked hard to ensure that our boys were able to gain full benefit from their trip to Hungary.

I would like to take this opportunity to thank, the reserves who pushed our team hard on every occasion, the whole of the Cadet Squad who participated in the sessions & training camps, the players personal coach’s and finally the Cadet Squad Coach’s who all worked tirelessly to make this Europeans a success.

What!!! the heck!! only thought I needed one other to help hold him down, if we can develop this it could be a wining move for our ground work. I wonder if the refs will notice the little bit of extra help?

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Today we had four players competing, we left the hotel at 6:00am, in good time to travel to the official Rada Hotel for the weigh-in.