No more medals for Indonesia as Juana crashes
By Primastuti Handayani
SYDNEY (JP): The second-round defeat of Juana Wangsa Putri in the 49kg division of women's taekwondo on Wednesday virtually buried Indonesia's hopes of adding medals to its collection.
Asian Games silver medalist Juana was expected to win at least the bronze in the South Korean martial art that was making its Olympic debut before reality hit. Lacking initiative, the Indonesian crashed out with a 2-7 loss to Hanne Hoegh Poulsen of Denmark, the 1998 world junior champion in the 47kg category.
Poulsen had sprang a surprise in the first round by beating favorite Kay Poe of the United States 4-3. Juana received a bye.
After playing a cautious game, Poulsen charged Juana with a flurry of attacks which left Juana on the receiving end. To make things worse, Juwana received a warning from Venezuelan referee Martin Ramon Blanco for a foul.
Poulsen's endless efforts again paid off in the final minutes as she collected two more points to stretch her lead and win the match.
Juana burst into tears after the panel of judges scored in favor of the Dane. National Sports Council (KONI) chairman Wismoyo Arismunandar and the Indonesian team's chef de mission Arie Sudewo proceeded to the court to console the 23-year-old athlete.
"I couldn't concentrate as the three umpires didn't count lots of my kicks," she said amid her sobs after the match.
The Indonesian Taekwondo Association (TI) secretary-general, Andreas Lumandow, expressed his disappointment with the result.
"Juana was very tense during the bout and that influenced her performance. She couldn't fight it out. Actually we hoped she would finish at least fourth on the overall," he said.
Juana did not have a second chance to compete in the repechage as Poulsen was beaten by Lauren Burns of Australia 0-1 in the semifinals. Burns eventually won the gold, the first for host Australia, after downing Urbia Melendez Rodriguez of Cuba 4-2 in the final.
Burns, who won the world championship bronze medal in 1997 and the U.S. Open last year, had beaten world 47kg champion Chi Shu- Ju of Taiwan in the quarterfinals.
In the men's 58kg final, Michail Mouroutsos of Greece took out Spain's Gabriel Esparza 4-2, while third spot went to Huang Chih- hsiung of Taiwan who overcame Gabriel Alberto Taraburelli of Argentina 3-0.
Indonesia's contention for medals received a further blow as its representative in the women's 3m springboard diving, Eka Purnama Indah, managed only to finish second from the bottom in the 43-field competition.
Eka collected a total of 178.83 points, far from the three top finishers Fu Mingxia of China with 342.75, Guo Jingjing of China with 332.67 and Ioulia Pakhalina of Russia with 316.08.
Men's springboard diver Muhammad Nasrullah and men's 4x100 meters relay team are the only Indonesian athletes left in the medal chase.