Karla Prodan doubles the success for Croatia

Another tremendous success in the judo history for Croatia. Youngster Karla Prodan has won the World Cadet title in Sarajevo. After Barbara Matic won the World Junior title twice and many other positive performances of the women, now this is another milestone in the history of the young nation.

Interesting enough Prodan took the World title in the same weight category where Matic operates. First of all the competition was in Sarajevo where German super talent, Cadet European champion and top seed Alina Boehm lost out to Prodan. The Croatian teen is Cadet European Champion and EYOF bronze medallist. Prodan won all four fights by ippon including the final after 71 seconds as her German rival had to settle for silver but still they shared a warm embrace after the Croatian was awarded the contest.

Prodan: “I had lost to Boehm at the cadet European championships and I was determined to win here,” said Prodan, who in the final countered Boehm’s rather weak tai otoshi with a tani otoshi for ippon and the gold medal. Prodan attributes some of her success to being able to train regularly with Barbara and Brigitta Matic in her hometown of Split. “They are happy to share advice with me and that is good for me,” said Prodan. In her final year as a cadet there is a great deal for Prodan to consider in particular whether she will remain at U70kg.

In the first semi-final Boehm defeated Cadet European Team Championships gold medallist Madina Taimazova (RUS) on shido penalties while in the second semi-final EYOF silver medallist Jovana Pekovic of Montenegro was beaten by Prodan by ippon from a ko-uchi-gari having led by a yuko.        

The first bronze medal was won by beaten semi-finalist Pekovic by a yuko to earn the first medal for Montenegro in Sarajevo as she beat Cadet European Cup bronze medallist Takaku Suzuka (JPN). The proud Pekovic realizes this is another great achievement for the country’s development after Srdjan Mrvaljevic won a World senior silver in 2011 and Arso Milic won a bronze Cadet World medal in 2013.

The second bronze medal was claimed by Russian Madina Taimazova who saw off 16-year-old Nefeli Papadakis (USA) with a waza-ari and yuko going unanswered.

Although Japan dominated the World Cadets with 4 gold medals, still 11 different winning nations is a positive distribution. Today was no exception with Croatia picking up its first Cadet World title in history.

For Croatia it was the second medal at this championship and the fourth at World Cadets ever.

U17 World Cup 2009 - Budapest (HUN)

3rd Place - Barbara Matic (U63kg)

U18 World Cup 2013 - Miami (HUN)

3rd place - Brigita Matic (U70kg)

U18 World Cup 2015 - Sarajevo (BIH)

2nd place - TiheaTopolovec (U52kg)

1st place - Karla Prodan (U70kg)