Japan breeze past Russia to claim mixed team title

After a morning full of drama, huge ippon throws and a number of surprising results, Japan claimed the mixed team title at the World Judo Championships in Baku.

The mighty Japanese defeated Russia in the final to lay claim to the crown.

With -70 kg being the first category in play, 2025 world champion Shiho Tanaka stepped forward to face world and Olympic medallist Madina Taimazova. It was a close contest only decided by a yuko in Tanaka’s favour, in golden score. Japan were 1-0 up with Murao coming on next.

Egor Andoni had the task of facing Japan’s new -90 kg double world champion and for the first 2 and a half minutes, he did well to keep things even. At that point though, Murao opened up and threw with uchi-mata to earn a yuko, doubling his lead just a little while later. Andoni gave a good account of himself but Murao has been untouchable through his stay in Azerbaijan. It was 2-0 to Japan.

Mao Arai and Daria Rechkalova were up next, with the former aiming to finish things in the first exchange in ne-waza. Rechkalova had to defend for a long time but did so very well and earned the chance to start again. She became much more active and applied pressure, Arai conceding two penalties. However as extra time began, Rechkalova attacked without then necessary preparation and was duly countered. Japan had their third win and just needed one more for the world mixed team title.

Tamerlan Bashaev was Russia’s pick for the final in the heavyweight category. He faced Kenta Nakano, one of few judoka ever to throw Tasoev, albeit a short-lived lead on that occasion. Bashaev grappled for position and managed to catch Nakano for a yuko but with a lot of time left in the clock, he remained in a precarious lead. With 44 seconds left, Nakano attacked with a huge o-guruma. It took everything Bashaev had to defend it but he managed to and so kept hold of his lead. Bashaev had won Russia’s first point of the match.

Akari Omori was up against Irina Zueva in the -57 kg contest. The Russian judoka began more aggressively and came close to tying Omori up on the floor. She continued to attack in tachi-waza once it was clear she couldn’t secure the osae-komi. Omori struggled to find her position but managed to turn in just once and caught Zueva for a yuko but in the transition phase the latter came close to applying a shime-waza, very close. With a minute to go, Omori was gaining confidence and she threw again, this time her sode-tsuri-komi-goshi scored a waza-ari. She had done enough. At 4-2 the gold was japan’s.