Commonwealth Games: NI trio miss out on judo bronze medals
Northern Ireland suffered disappointment in their pursuit of more judo medals at the Commonwealth Games as three judokas lost bronze medal matches on Tuesday.
Eoin Fleming, Rachael Hawkes and Joshua Green were one win away from the podium but missed out at Coventry Arena.
NI were on the hunt for more medals after Yasmin Javadian and Nathon Burns won bronze a day earlier.
Sarah Hawkes is the final NI judoka to begin her campaign on Wednesday.
Fleming, who lost at the same stage in Glasgow eight years ago, lost in gut-wrenching fashion against Australia's Uros Nikolic.
NI fighter sustained a bad ankle injury and could barely stand let alone fight at the contest went to Golden Score, but after the bravest of efforts a tearful Fleming simply could not continue.
Green was beaten in his bid for a men's -73kg medal as impressive Australian Jake Bensted took his second Commonwealth gold in just one minute and 13 seconds.
It was similar disappointment for Hawkes who missed out in the women's -70kg against Katie-Jemima Yeats-Brown of England.
Earlier on Tuesday NI had maintained their strong showing in the judo as Fleming reached the semi-finals of his category.
Fleming advanced to the last four with two wins, firstly edging a hard-fought encounter with Odysseas Georgakis of Cyprus before securing a lightning-fast win by ippon over Nauru's Kip Kosam in the quarters, but was then beaten in the last four by impressive Canadian Francois Gauthier Drapeau
Fleming, 27, would agonisingly miss out in the bronze medal match for the second time, having suffered the same fate at Glasgow 2014, as he sought NI's third judo medal of the Birmingham Games after team-mates Yasmin Javadian and Nathon Burns both won bronze on Monday.
Hawkes lost her quarter-final to Jamaica's Ebony Drysdale Daley but received a bye in the repechage so advances directly to the medal contest.
Green claimed a dramatic Golden Soint repechage win over Sri Lankan Chamal Repiyallage after losing his quarter-final defeat by Cypriot Dato Matsoukatov, who was awarded the win by ippon.
Earlier he had dispatched of Trinidad and Tobago's Jelanie Boyce in just 34 seconds.