JUDO: Jake Bensted won the Australia’s first judo bout of the Rio 2016 Olympic Games before bowing out in the round of 16 at Carioca Area 2.

The -73kg fighter began the competition with a strong win over Andrew Mlugu of Tanzania before going down to Azebaijan’s Rustam Orujov.

After the early victory, Bensted came out full of confidence in his second fight but it was always going to be tough against the gold medal contending Azerbaijani.

“I left it all out there, I’m disappointed with the result but I’m happy with how I fought,” Bensted said.

“The plan from the start was to make it a dog fight, take it to him but I just got caught and that’s judo.”

Bensted was the aggressor throughout the opening exchanges but Orujov applied an arm lock with just under two minutes to go to give him the victory by ippon.

“He is world number two at the moment so it’s good to be able to put in a showing like that against him.

“I still would have like to have got the win on the board.”

Bensted was on debut in Rio but has his heart set on this not being the last he sees of Olympic competition.

“I’ll be back for four years in Tokyo for sure and hopefully at the next Games I will be in medal contention.”

The 2014 Commonwealth Games bronze medallist got his first Olympic victory earlier in the day by ippon over the lower ranked Tanzanian.

“I got a good draw and had a bit of an easier fight so I got out there and executed the plan and it all went well.”

Judo competition continues on Day 4 with Eoin Coughlan (-81kg) and Katharina Haecker (-63kg) both in action for Australia.

Matt Bartolo
olympics.com.au