The main sporting event of the second half of
\n2018 was the tennis tournament in Wimbledon, a competition that ended with
\nlackluster results for the Romanian delegation. The odds-on favourite of the
\nwomen’s singles contest, Romanian Simona Halep, was defeated by Su-Wei Hsieh of
\nTaiwan 3-6, 6-4, 7-5 in the competition’s third round. It was Halep’s main
\ndefeat after the Grand Slam trophy she had won at Roland Garros. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The next major competition was the BRD Open,
\nthe only major WTA tennis tournament hosted by Romania. The singles contest was
\nwon by Latvian challenger Anastasija Sevastova who outperformed Petra Martic of
\nCroatia in the finals 7-6, 6-2. Irina Begu and Andreea Mitu emerged as winners
\nof the doubles contest after securing a two-set win 6-3, 6-4 against Danka
\nKovinic of Montenegro and Maryna Zanevska of Belgium. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The most important performance of July was secured
\nby fencer Ana Maria Popescu who won silver in the epee event of the World
\nFencing Championships held in Wuxi, China. The Romanian successively defeated
\nKanna Oishi of Japan, Italian Rossella Fiamingo, Joan Feybi Bejura and Olena
\nKrivitka. The Romanian outperformed Courtney Hurley of the United States in the
\nsemis but lost to Italian Maria Navarria in the finals. Ana Maria Popescu thus
\nclinched her best performance in a World Championship. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
Rowers from Romania in August found
\nthemselves among the European rowing elite as the delegation representing us at
\nthe European Championships in Glasgow stepped onto the first step of the podium
\nin the nations standings with no less than seven medals out of which three
\ngold, two silver and two bronze. The Romanian women’s pair and eight walked
\naway with gold, and so did the Romanian men’s four. The Romanian men’s double
\nscull and our women’s four stepped onto the podium’s second step, while the
\nRomanian men’s eight and pair became bronze medalists. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Romanian tennis player Mihaela Buzarnescu
\nreaped the first WTA title in her career with a 6-1, 6-0 win against Maria
\nSakkari of Greece in the finals of the San Jose tournament. The victory earned
\nBuzarnescu a place among the world’s top 20 players for the first time in her
\ncareer. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Romania’s best tennis player Simona Halep made
\nit to the finals of the tennis tournament in Cincinnati where she conceded
\ndefeat 2-6, 7-6, 6-2 to Kiki Bertens in a match that lasted for more than two
\nhours. The pair made up of Romanian Horia Tecau and Jean-Julien Rojer of the
\nNetherlands qualified for the semifinals of the men’s doubles in the same
\ntennis tournament. The same Romanian-Dutch pair later won the tournament in
\nWinston-Salem after a 6-4, 6-2 win against American Jamie Cerretani and Leander
\nPaes of India. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
In September rowers from Romania walked away
\nwith two medals, silver and gold, from the World’s Rowing Championship hosted
\nby the Bulgarian city of Plovdiv. The crew made up of Ionela – Livia Cozmiuc
\nand Gianina – Elena Beleaga reaped gold in the lightweight women’s double-scull
\nrace, with the United States and the Netherlands coming second and third
\nrespectively. The Romanian pair Marius Cozmiuc and Ciprian Tudosa stepped onto
\nthe podium’s second step after a race won by Croatia with France coming in
\nthird. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The city of Cluj in western Romania saw a
\nDavis Cup match between the teams of Romania and Poland who were vying for a
\nbetter position in Group 1 of the Europe\/Africa zone. The match was won by
\nPoland 3-2. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The month of September was of good omen for
\ntable tennis players from Romania; Ovidiu Ionescu became silver medalist in the
\nmen’s event of the European Championships hosted by Alicante in Spain. Ionescu
\nthus equaled the performance obtained by Radu Negulescu in Zagreb in 1960. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
In October, the Romanian champions in women’s
\nhandball CSM Bucharest started off on the right foot in the present edition of
\nthe Champions League with a 36-31 win against the Hungarian challenger
\nFerencvaros Budapest. Cristina Neagu was the best scorer of the Romanian side
\nwith 9 goals in the game. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Also in October, Bucharest saw the largest
\nathletic contest annually hosted by Romania. Roughly 20 thousand athletes
\nparticipated in the International Bucharest marathon at its 11th
\nedition. The trophy went to Kenyan runner Hosea Kipkemboi and to Almaz Gelana
\nErba of Ethiopia, who won the women’s contest. Maxim Raileanu of the Republic
\nof Moldova and Maria Magdalena Veliscu of Romania won the half-marathon race. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
In late October, Marius Copil came very close
\nto the best individual performance in Romanian tennis of the past decade. Copil
\nlost the ATP 500 finals in Basel, Switzerland, to Swiss challenger Roger
\nFederer who secured a two-set win 7-6, 6-4. On his way to the finals Copil had outperformed
\nsix opponents on higher positions in the world ranking, such as Marin Cilic of
\nCroatia, number six and German Alexander Zverev, the world’s number five at
\nthat time, whom he defeated in the semifinals. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
In early November Tecau and Rojer made it to
\nthe doubles finals of the ATP Masters 1000 in Paris, a competition with roughly
\n5 million euros in prize money. Unfortunately, the two lost in the finals to
\nSpanish Marcel Granollers and Rajeev Ram of the USA 6-4, 6-4. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
The delegation that represented Romania at
\nthe World’s Weightlifting Championships came back home with three medals.
\nLoredana Toma won silver in the snatch event of the 64-kilogram category and
\nCristina Iovu became bronze medalist in the 55-kilogram category. Nicolae Onica
\nreaped bronze in the total event of the 96-kilogram category. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
Also in November, Romania’s rugby side
\nsecured a 36-6 win in a tie match against Portugal for a place in Rugby Europe
\nChampionship. We recall that following a World Rugby decision to boot out Romania
\nfrom Rugby World Cup 2019 in Japan and penalize it with 25 points for having
\nfielded an ineligible player in the qualification tournament, Romania is
\ncurrently on the last position in Rugby Europe Championship 2018 and had to
\nplay the match against Portugal, winner of Rugby Europe Trophy 2018. <\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
<\/p>\n
\n
<\/p>\n
The month of December was dominated by the
\nEuropean Women’s Handball Championships, where the Romanian side came fourth.
\nOur handballers conceded a 20-24 defeat against the Netherlands in a match
\ncounting for the third position in the competition. The best Romanian player
\nwas Crina Pintea who also got included in the competition all-star team as the
\nbest pivot. A place among Europe’s best handball squads has secured plane
\ntickets for our handballers at the World Championship due in Japan next year. The
\nEuropean title for the first time went to France who defeated Russia in the
\nfinals 24-21. <\/p>\n
(Translated by D. Bilt)<\/span>
A look back at the best performances grabbed by our athletes this year<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":93,"featured_media":114233,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"footnotes":""},"categories":[40940],"tags":[41610,2018],"coauthors":[],"class_list":["post-118970","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sport","tag-roundup-of-sporting-events","tag-vaccinare-romania-covid19-efecte-adverse"],"acf":[],"yoast_head":"\n
\n
<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"