South Korea took silver in the women’s sabre fencing team event at the Paris Olympics on Saturday, after blowing a late lead against Ukraine in the final.
South Korea, world No. 4, lost to third-ranked Ukraine 45-42 at Grand Palais in the French capital.
Jeon Eun-hye, Jeon Ha-young, Choi Se-bin and alternate Yoon Ji-su tried to give South Korea its first gold in the women’s sabre team event. South Korea won bronze at the 2021 Tokyo Olympics but Yoon, 31, was the only carryover from that team in Paris.
South Korea held a 40-37 lead entering the ninth and final bout. But Olga Kharlan outscored Jeon Ha-young 8-2 to complete Ukraine’s comeback.
Team fencing matches are contested in a series of nine head-to-head bouts. Each bout is three minutes long but it ends when one team’s score reaches a multiple of five.
The objective is to score 45 points first or to have more points than the opponent at the end of the ninth bout.
Jeon Eun-hye lost the opening bout to Kharlan 5-3, but then Jeon Ha-young handled Yuli
ia Bakastova 7-3 to put South Korea up 10-8.
In the fourth bout, Jeon Eun-hye beat Bakastova 5-1 to extend South Korea’s lead to 20-14.
But Kharlan singlehandedly led Ukraine’s comeback. In the sixth bout, she outscored Choi 9-5 to make this a two-point match at 25-23 South Korea.
The teams each scored five points in the next two bouts, and then South Korea went up by three, 40-37, after Jeon Eun-hye edged Alina Komashchuk 5-4 in the penultimate bout.
Jeon Ha-young, though, couldn’t preserve that three-point advantage.
Kharlan, the bronze medal winner in the individual event on Monday, scored the first three points to tie it up at 40-40. Jeon briefly pulled ahead with two points, but she didn’t score again as Kharlan grabbed the next five points to complete the rally that gave Ukraine its first gold medal of the Paris Olympics.
This was South Korea’s final fencing event. The country won gold medals in the men’s sabre individual and team events, before adding the women’s sabre team silver Saturday night.
Source: Yonhap News Agency