Hamburg judo team claims 2020 German Bundesliga title

Hamburg judo team won its fourth German Championship title. On Saturday in Senftenberg Hamburg captured the title again after they won the Bundesliga in 2016, 2017 and 2018. In the final In the Niederlausitzhalle, the North Germans clearly prevailed 7-0 against the Witten-Annen Sports Union. Witten had surprisingly defeated last year's runner-up, KSV Esslingen, 4:3 in the semi-finals.

The final started with two quick early wins for Hamburg. Moritz Plafky ended the encounter in U60kg category after 17 seconds against Erik Hobein. Yerrick Schriever (U66kg) scored two wazari against Leon Philipp. In the category U73kg Ferdinand Karapetian and Matthijs von Harten went into the golden score extension without any scores. Karapetian though scored the decisive score to 3-0 for Hamburg after almost seven minutes. Dominic Ressel  in his own category U81kg made the early decision. Already after 2:13 he ended his fight against Aeneas Paul with a strangle.

Hamburg team also won the other fights: Max Münsterberg defeated Dutchman Jim Heijman U90kg, Dario Kurbjeweit Garcia prevailed against Max Strote U100kg and Georgian Gela Zaalishvili gave Jonas Schreiber no chance among the heavyweights.

The big surprise in the semifinals was the Witten-Annen Sports Union, which unexpectedly beat the German runner-up KSV Esslingen 4: 3. On the Witten side, Jim Heijman defeated the 2018 world champion Saeid Mollaei. Hamburg also prevailed 4-3 against UJKC Potsdam in the second semi-final.

For this final tournament, a comprehensive hygiene concept was drawn up with the organiser in advance. New German Federation President Daniel Keller praised the implementation of organising club KSC Asahi Spremberg and the numerous helpers: "We want to protect the health of all athletes and the spectators in the hall as much as possible." In contrast to normal matches in the Bundesliga, where two rounds per team match are held, at the final four this year only one single round with seven weight classes was fought. The start of the season, which was originally planned for March, was completely lost due to the corona pandemic. Of the 16 first division clubs in the North and South groups, six ultimately took part in the final tournament. Defending champion TSV Abensberg had also canceled his participation in advance.