Eljan Hajiyev of Azerbaijan has been on an upward trajectory since his Junior European success, but now he can be safely established as one of the top -90kg men on the senior circuit.
The European Judo Union published an article on this matter, Idman.biz reports
In 2024 he made waves by defeating the Olympic Champion, Lasha Bekauri (GEO), going on to secure the European Championship title in Zagreb. Things were looking great for him but he didn’t perform how he expected in the Olympic Games and went back to the drawing board. Unfortunately, that also meant two surgeries on both his shoulder and knee.
“For eight or nine months, there was no training, only being allowed to work on my shoulder and knee. Then I had a period of hard, really hard training actually. Not like before, because without normal training my weight was up, up to 105kg! Now after taking a Grand Slam gold medal this year, my result today is very good.”
It was a long road to recovery and months away from the tatami, but after some serious work in, he returned. Some around him have said that a world bronze win would feel like gold, but asking him the question, it was a very quick, ‘no’.
“Yes I’m very happy, but I came here today for the gold. Maybe eight months I’ve been working for this moment. I can still be happy with the bronze though. The semi final, I can say I was tired, I wanted a quick ippon, not a waza ari. I really thought with that first score, I won. Then in the minutes, my opponent, last years World Champion did a throw that maybe I’ve seen him try a few times but not typically. After, he caught me! After the fight I might have cried for two hours, I just really felt like it could be mine but thanks to my coaches, I could come back to fight for the medal.”
A medal finally came to the team yesterday from Zelim Tckaev in the -81kg category and potentially more on the horizon, does the strength of the team motivate him?
“Of course, Hidayat Heydarov became European, World and Olympic Champion in one year and he always gives me great motivation and tomorrow we have Zelym Kotsoiev, I hope that he will take the gold.”
Idman.biz
