PH judo chief rues ref's 'wrong' judgement in Kiyomi Watanabe's bout: 'They made a mistake'

Philippine Judo Federation president Dave Carter aired his disappointment after a 'painful' loss that judoka Kiyomi Watanabe endured during her bout in the 2020 Tokyo Olympics earlier today.

The Filipino-Japanese Watanabe bowed out of contention via an ippon decision with just barely a minute into her clash with Cristina Cabana Perez of Spain in the Round of 32 of women's -63 kg.

She was thrown to the corner of the mat by her Spanish foe, prompting the referee to award the first waza-ari to the opponent. Then it was later upgraded to an ippon, ultimately putting an end to Watanabe's Olympic campaign.

But according to Carter, the point should not have been awarded to Cabana Perez as the technique was executed by Watanabe.

Carter called it a 'gravely wrong decision' on the part of the referee to give the mark to the Spain's bet.

"Yes, it was wrong. I am also an international referee. I understand the rules very well. They made a mistake," Carter told GMA News Online in a message Tuesday.

In a previous interview, Carter shared that Watanabe had been preparing hard for the Summer Games.

In fact, the 24-year-old Judoka, and her entire team, did high altitude training in Yamanashi in Japan en route to her maiden Olympic stint. She also did training sessions at the Waseda University where several foreign athletes were also doing their buildup.

Carter stressed the defeat was hard on the part of both Watanabe and the federation but bared the loss will serve as their motivation moving forward.

"This was a very painful loss for Kiyomi and for us. Very painful. We find it hard to explain to the POC and PSC. However, we are very thankful to PSC Chairman Butch (Ramirez) for all PSC's support and to POC President Cong. Bambol (Tolentino) for the trust that he bestowed Kiyomi.

"We will come back."

—JMB, GMA News