One step away from repeating the team record: Russian wrestlers won the medal standings at the World Championships in Oslo

The World Wrestling Championship has come to an end in Oslo. In the final two days of the competition, the Russian national team won four more medals, which allowed domestic athletes to become leaders in the total number of awards in the tournament. Also, Greco-Roman wrestlers won the team competition for the fifth time in a row. True, the "classics" did not have more gold medals after the victory of Roman Vlasov, despite the fact that two Russians were one step away from the award of the highest standard.

Zurabi Gedekhauri, who competed in the heaviest weight category up to 130 kg, had an excellent chance to become a champion.

To make it to the final, a wrestler of Georgian origin had to create a sensation and pass his fellow countryman Yakob Kajai, who won the silver medal at the Tokyo Games.

This year they have already met at the European Championship, and then the representative of Georgia won.

But Gedekhauri managed to take revenge by taking advantage of the opponent's lost challenge.

His rival in the decisive battle was the young Iranian Ali Akbar Yousefi.

At first, the Russian managed to control his opponent, but very quickly the difference in physical form became noticeable.

Gedekhauri quickly spent all his strength and did not resist when Yusefi simply pushed him off the carpet over and over again.

The final score was 5: 1 in favor of the Iranian.

In Oslo, in general, there were many Russian-Iranian confrontations for gold, and for the fourth time representatives of the two countries met in the weight category up to 67 kg. Here the advantage was clearly on the side of the Iranian athlete. Nazir Abdullaev, who made his debut at the world championships at the age of 30, was opposed by Olympic champion Mohammad Gerayi. On the way to the final, he was marked by a victory on the carcass, losing on points, and an early battle won with a score of 11: 0, while Abdullaev went to the main match of the tournament in a more thorny way.

In the first period of the decisive bout, Abdullaev was deprived of the right to wrestle on the ground, but when he himself was in it, he could surprisingly easily escape from the reverse grip and return to the stance. For Geraya, the final clearly did not work out, and for some time he showed with all his appearance that he had already lost the necessary condition. However, this impression turned out to be misleading. After the break, the Iranian sharply entered the body and threw Abdullayev on his back, thereby earning the key four points. The Russian wrestler tried to recoup and almost reduced the gap to a minimum, but still was defeated.

The rest of the medals of Russian wrestlers in the last days of the championship of the planet were with a bronze tint.

In the weight category up to 60 kg, the country was represented by the 2018 world champion Stepan Maryanyan.

In the quarterfinals, he met with the Moldovan Victor Ciobanu and led with a difference of three points, but still lost.

Thanks to the fact that Chobanu also made a heroic comeback in the semifinal match with Armenian Gevorg Garibyan and won, losing 0: 6, Maryanyan went to the consolation tournament.

There he did not miss his chance and won his fourth medal at the World Championships in a fight with a wrestler from Armenia.

“When the last fight is victorious, and you leave the world championship with a medal, there is little satisfaction, but I came here for the gold and had to win. I know what it is like to come home without a medal, it's good that there is at least a bronze medal, but this is not the medal that I wanted and that was expected of me. I won the world championship, I already had gold, I was in these competitions for the fifth time, and the victory was within my power, I could, I was in good shape, I made weight without any problems, but, apparently, it was not destined. An offensive defeat in the quarterfinals: he was in the lead and ... "- the 30-year-old wrestler assessed his performance.

In the weight up to 97 kg, the honor of the national team instead of the Olympic champion Musa Yevloyev tried to defend the rookie Arthur Sargsyan.

The debut at such a high level almost turned out to be a failure - the 23-year-old wrestler in the first fight initially won against the Iranian Mohammad Sarawi, but missed all his advantage in the second period.

Fortunately for the Russian, the bronze medalist of the Tokyo Olympics eventually made it to the final, and Arthur had the opportunity to fight his rivals for bronze.

Sargsyan won each of them with a difference of five points and was able to console himself with the first prize from the world championship.

In total, at the World Championships in Oslo, the Russian national team won 18 medals - one less than at the last tournament, which became the most successful for it in this indicator.

Although the team was behind Iran, the United States and Japan in terms of the number of gold medals, it remained unattainable in terms of the total number of awards.

Since 2013, Russian wrestlers will certainly be leaders in this indicator at the world championships.