The women's team foil competition at the Tokyo Olympics has officially come to a close with ROC's group of Larisa Korobeynikova, Inna Deriglazova and Marta Martyanova taking gold over France's quartet of Ysaora Thibus, Anita Blaze, Pauline Ranvier and Astrid Guyart.
ROC got off to an excellent start thanks to strong bouts from Korobeynikova and Deriglazova, giving them a quick two-rounds-to-none lead. However, Martyanova suffered an apparent injury to her left ankle in the third round, prompting an injury timeout that put ROC's momentum on pause. Luckily, Martyanova remained in the bout and stormed back to force a 4-4 tie in the round after initially falling into a 3-1 hole.
The gutsy performance from Martyanova set up Korobeynikova for a big 6-3 win in the fourth round, but Martyanova clearly appeared hindered by her ankle injury in her next action, resulting in Thibus earning France its first victory of the match.
Still, Thibus' victory wasn't enough for France to get back into the match. ROC battled on to win the match by a score of 45-34, giving Deriglazova her fourth Olympic medal.
Deriglazova and Korobeynikova both added to their Tokyo medal total with this win over France. Deriglazova also won a silver medal in individual foil while Korobeynikova won bronze in the same event.
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Italy Takes Bronze
For the bronze medal, the United States trio of Lee Kiefer, Nicole Ross and Sabrina Massialas took on Italy's Arianna Errigo, Martina Batini and Alice Volpi. This was Massialas' first action at the Tokyo Olympics, as she subbed in for Jacqueline Dubrovich and did not take part in the women's individual foil competition.
Ross got the U.S. off to a solid start, beating Errigo by a score of 5-3 in her first bout. From that point on, though, the Italians had complete control. Kiefer, who won the gold for individual foil, fell 7-5 to Batini. Massialas then fell 5-4 to Volpi before Ross was easily defeated 5-1 by Batini.
Italy's run of success continued for the remainder of the match, winning eight consecutive rounds. In the end, the Italians won the match by a final combined score of 45-23.