Flyweight (≤58 kilograms), Men

The man to beat in this category was Farzan Ashour Zadeh, the 19-year-old Iranian known as “Tsunami” who burst onto the scene in 2014 and the following year became world champion. With the 2012 Olympic champion Joel González of Spain moving up a division, the way was clear for the young Iranian top seed to take gold, although the man who beat him in the 2015 Grand Prix Final, South Korea’s Kim Tae-Hun, was seeded two in Rio and posed a serious threat. Also fancied for a medal were number three seed Rui Bragança of Portugal and another experienced man, Levant Tuncat of Germany

Mourad Laachraoui was the 2016 European champion in this division and his place in Rio seemed likely until the Belgian Federation gave it to Si Mohamed Ketbi on the strength of his higher world ranking. Laachraoui would have been an interesting inclusion in the Belgian team because his older brother Najim was an Islamist terrorist and one of the two suicide bombers involved in the 2016 Brussels airport attack.

The day of shocks in the Carioca Arena 3 continued following Wu Jingyu’s shock defeat in the quarter-final of the women’s event, when the men’s favourite Farzan Ashour Zadeh lost in the first round 4-3 to Omar Hajjami of Morocco – the world number 80 and 16th seed. The Iranian was then joined by number two seed Kim Tae-Hun, who was also beaten in the first round, 12-10 by Tawin Hanprab of Thailand. Brazil’s Venilton Teixeira and Portugal’s Bragança were the only two of the top four seeds to progress to the last eight, while the German Tuncat went out through disqualification.

Hanprab, the number 15 seed went onto the final where he met China’s Zhao Shuai and it was the number eight seed who ran out the 6-4 winner to became the first man to win a taekwondo gold for China while 18-year-old Hangpran won Thailand’s first men’s Olympic medal. Luisito Pié of the Dominican Republic and Kim Tae-Hun each won a bronze medal.