London 2012: Olympic tae kwon-do gold for Jade Jones

Aug 10 2012 By Alec Doyle

TEENAGE tae kwon-do sensation Jade Jones has become Britain's first ever Olympic gold medalist in the sport after winning the -57kg final at London's ExCeL Arena.

Starting at 10.30 on Thursday morning, the Flint fighter dispached Serbia's Dragana Gladovic, Japan's Mayu Hamada and Chinese Taipei's Tseng Li-Cheng on her way to the final at 10.15pm the same night.

Facing China's Hou Yuzhuo, the favourite in many people's eyes, Jones was mature in her approach which led to a cautious and scoreless opening round.

In the second round both fighters realised they had to take a few more risks in order to get points on the board but it was a foul call in the middle of the second which gave Jade the lead.

She quickly followed that up with a body shot to double the lead and took a 2-0 advantage into the third and final round.

Such a slender gap was nothing to sit back on however and some trouble with her left ankle, caused by a couple of clashes between the joint and Yuzhuo's knee, seemed likely to hamper her.

But Jones is made of stern stuff and she shook off the pain to score another body shot. Yuzhuo's frustration began to take over as the time ticked away and she began to attack more wildly allowing Jones to pick off a couple more points.

And although the Chinese athlete regained enough composure to close the gap at the death, she ran out of time as the 19-year-old former Flint High School pupil secured the greatest prize, Olympic gold.

Afterwards a clearly overwhelmed Jones said: "It still doesn't feel real, it feels crazy. The crowd has just been amazing. My coach Paul Green has been amazing, I couldn't have done it without him.

"To be first ever British athlete to win tae kwon-do gold is amazing. To win Olympic gold is special but to do it in front of my friends and family is amazing."

Green added his tribute to his golden girl.

"The work this girl has put in has been ridiculous. She's been in tears every other day. She's been up at 6am every day.

"She's still got improvements to make and that's what we can do over the next cycle."