Randall throws it all away

Britain has just three fully-fledged world champions at this Olympics, which makes them a precious commodity. The coxless four can still add Olympic gold to their world crown, as can Colin Jackson in the 110m hurdles. For Graeme Randall, however, the moment has passed.

You could say Randall fell by the wayside, but the metaphor is too active. In his quest to add the Olympic 81kg gold to the world title he won in Birmingham last autumn, the Scot wandered off the path, strayed into the undergrowth. It was that sort of demise.

The opening was as sparkling as any méthode champenoise . Within 33 seconds, the Edinburgh fighter had disposed of his first opponent, Tunisia's Abdessalem Arous, with a full ippon.

It was explosive stuff, and he started his second fight against the Iranian Kazem Sarikhani in a similar fashion. Randall, on song, is a difficult man to get to grips with. He shares, with a high jumper doing the Fosbury Flop, the canny ability to keep his centre of gravity lower than anyone imagines it to be. It makes him very difficult to throw.

Quickly securing a koka, the lowest score, and earning points when his opponent was penalised, Randall looked in easy control of the bout, when something curious happened. Perhaps he was considering the effectiveness of the Scottish parliament or wondering how a pair of pigeons had fluttered into the arena moments earlier. Perhaps he thought that world champions were given more space and time than anyone else and he could linger awhile.

But after one tussle, Randall was slow to rise and slower still to adjust his suit and return to the mark. He had committed the heinous crime in judo of loitering with no intent whatsoever. He might as well have fetched an armchair, pipe and slippers, for the penalty would have been the same. In judo, passivity is a felony.

The referee immediately awarded a penalty score (shido) against Randall and the advantage so preciously built was gone, the momentum lost. Sarikhani scored a koka himself and Randall, his kilted father David watching from the stands, compounded the felony by conceding another penalty.

In the last minute, the Iranian adopted an unusual strategy that involved leading each attack with one foot raised as if Randall were a ladder. More frustration from the Scot led to one last penalty, against both fighters, but it mattered more to Randall for the accumulation of points took his opponent's score up to the full 10.

So Randall was out and, not too long afterwards, Sarikhani, in his next fight, was also out. The Scot did not even have the lifeline of a repechage. He left the complex at the first opportunity but, caught briefly by the exit door, he admitted the fight had been "sewn up" before he gave it away.

But he was philosophical. "Real life is the important thing. It's make-believe sometimes on the mat, you are acting out a role . . . it's not the end of the world, I'm going home to watch the birth of my child, finish my degree and get married," he said, in that order.

While Randall was off for the first beer of the night, Karen Roberts was still a fight away from departing the women's 63kg competition. She, too, had won her first bout, before losing to the German Anja von Rekowski, whose subsequent success qualified Roberts for the repechage. She duly lost in that, but at least this was a night in which Britons won two fights.

It was all very different for the Koreans up in the stands who, led by three Australian cheerleaders of Korean extraction, chanted for the Korean, whether from north or south, whenever one stepped on the mat. These are changing times indeed.

They were rewarded with two medals on the night, a silver to Cho In-chul in the men's 81kg and a bronze to Jung Sung-sook in the women's 63kg. In unity, it seems, lies strength.