Kenichiro Fumita advanced to his second straight 60-kilogram Greco Roman Olympic wrestling final on Monday, August 5 and will be bidding for gold in Tuesday's final.
Down a point in the first period, Fumita unleashed a spectacular four-point throw of Kyrgyzstan's Zholaman Sharshenbekov on Monday, hurling the two-time world champion over his shoulder to get another chance at gold.
Fumita won the Olympic silver medal three years ago in Tokyo, losing in the final to Luis Orta of Cuba.
Sharshenbekov went on the attack and got the 28-year-old Fumita to the ground for two points, but ran out of time to do more damage as the bout finished 4-3 with the Japanese awarded the victory.
The victory avenged a loss to Sharshenbekov in the final at the 2023 World Wrestling Championships in Belgrade, when the Kyrgyz star prevailed 11-6.
"I think the reason I was able to make the final again was because the wrestling gods were on my side, telling me to win the gold medal," Fumita said, according to Kyodo News.
In the other semifinal, Liguo Cao from China got the win over Se Ung Ri of North Korea with a last-second throw.
The bout finished 3-3, but Cao was awarded the win as the last wrestler to score a technical point.
Kenichiro Fumita Determined to Do His Best
Fumita, a 2017 and 2019 world champion, is set to meet Cao on Tuesday evening (approximately 1:30 AM Wednesday JST).
"I'll do my best in the next match so that people will say that I am really strong," the Japanese wrestler said.
"Paris is a special place because I won my first world title here in 2017," he told the Japanese media.
Fumita is hoping to be Japan's first Greco-Roman gold medalist since Atsuji Miyahara in 1984.
Japan won five gold medals in wrestling at the Tokyo Games three years ago, with four coming from the women's side in freestyle wrestling. The only male wrestler to win gold for Japan was Takuto Otoguro in the 65-kg freestyle class.
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Author: Jim Armstrong
The author is a longtime journalist who has covered sports in Japan for over 25 years. You can find his articles on SportsLook.
