Kim polling grabs awkward lead role in team thriller

What a story at the mixed team championships today in the first round in Abu Dhabi. The Netherlands fights against Italy and a salient detail is Kim Polling's recent move from the Netherlands to Italy because she married and lives in Italy. The Netherlands opens in the up to 70kg weight and loses against the ‘Dutch’ Kim Polling who takes Italy to a 1-0 lead. The Netherlands then convinces with three wins over Italy to take a 3-1 lead.

Then the weight up to 57kg with now seeded Julie Beurskens losing to an inflamed Capanni Dias who takes the win with attacking judo. Then it was Giovanni Esposito's turn to level the score against Koen heg who was flown in for the team tournament. The Netherlands does not have a great reputation in -73kg but Heg stands his ground with great groundwork but is just seconds short of a hold against Esposito. The Italian escapes and then scores a wazari to make it 3-3. The draw determines which weight to go over again and the script was written that it obviously had to be the -70kg v category. So out comes the thriller with Kim Polling again against Hilde Jager. Missing from the Dutch team is Sanne van Dijke who has long qualified for the games but had to drop out injured just before the World Championships. She won the battle for Olympics qualification from Kim Polling.

Polling has to do it for her new country Italy and chases down Jager and pulls off the win with a wazari in the golden score as every extension match is decided in the golden score. It is Polling who gets an emotional win over Jager and apologises to the team. The Italian teammate understands her emotions and not least her coach Francesco Bruyere catches the crying Polling with her teammates. The young mother is understandably emotional and honoured to be out for Italy at the games, but she did not expect this scenario this morning. Italy continue against France in the Mixed team event.