Triumphant premiere for Greece with five medals in the European Boys/Girls Tae-Kwon-Do

Four finals with two gold and two silver medals, but also one bronze, as well as two fifth places connected the puzzle of the Greek presence of the young athletes who participated in the opening day of the European Boys/Girls Taekwondo Championship.

On the highest step of the winners’ podium were Paraskevi Kalogirou in the -148cm category, as well as Athanasios Tsitakis at -152cm. The second place was occupied by Enrieta Berberi and Giorgos Mavridis at -156cm, while Charalambos Aidonidis was third at -152cm.

The fifth place in the girls’ -152cm, -144cm and -156cm went to Sofia Protonotariou, Christina-Eugenia Sifaki and Eleni Aslanoglou. With these five medals, Greece reached 55, nine of which were gold.

Kalogirou, a few weeks after winning the bronze medal at the Girls’ World Championship, on Thursday, with four wins in as many matches, topped the -148cm category. She defeated 2-0 the British Kim, the Bosnian Croat and Maria Kukusoudis, who competes with the national emblem of Germany, while in the final she prevailed 6-2, 5-0 against the Bulgarian Mihailska.

Tsitakis needed a victory in the Greek “civil war” in the -152cm semi-finals to be able to advance to the final. After victories over the French Saib (2-0) and the Belarusian Pakhrudinov, he was invited to the foursome to face Charalambos Aidonidis, who also came from two consecutive victories (2-0 against the Ukrainian Hopko, 2-0 against the Danish Aulagi ).

Tsitakis emerged unscathed from the Greek “civil war” with a score of 2-0, while with the same score (13-5, 14-3) he overcame the Croatian Nikolic in the final, reaching the top, at the same time that Aidonidis was third.

The four wins that Mavridis scored were not enough to bring him to the top of the -156cm category. In the final, where he qualified after victories over the Armenian Badalian, the Polish Drus, the Bulgarian Vakavchiev and the Turkish Yildiz, he was defeated by the Italian Senesi 2-1 (11-12, 13-1, 12-0), thus occupying second place.

Berberi scored one less victory, but with the same result, i.e. taking second place at -156cm. She beat Tkmamokova (ETU) 2-0, Serva Radovanov 2-0 and Spain’s Rodriguez 2-1, but in the final she lost 9-1, 17-10 to Turkala Karagiel.

It should be noted that Berberi had qualified for the European Championship in Belgrade through the Presidents Cup, while Aidonidis through the European Club Championship.

Kalogirou, Tsitakis, Mavridis, Aslanoglou, Protonotariou and Sifaki participated in the event as members of the National team after the first place they took in the qualifying championship of ELOT held in OAKA and SEF.