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Great Britain’s Caden Cunningham has vowed to become the “king of taekwondo” despite being forced to settle for a silver medal in the men’s +80kg category at the Paris Olympics.
The Huddersfield 21-year-old continued his remarkable trajectory by beating three world champions en route to the gold-medal match which he lost narrowly to Iran’s Arian Salimi.
Cunningham won the first round 6-3 but was edged out in the next two as his tall and accurate opponent pulled away to ensure his nation’s third taekwondo gold.
“It’s the start of whatever I want,” said Cunningham afterwards. “I work very hard, if I choose something else I choose something else and I’ll master it.
“If I stay with this, I’ll be the king of taekwondo for the next four years, no problem. One fight doesn’t define me as a fighter, I’m sure people will have watched that and saw that I’m a strong fighter, but I didn’t get the result.”
Cunningham’s medal sealed a gutsy comeback from a serious knee injury in his opening bout at the 2022 World Championships in Mexico, which forced him out of action for a number of months.
Growing slowly into his first Olympics, he appeared overly cautious in an initial win over Niger’s Abdoul Issoufou, before riding his luck to win the final round of his next bout against Cuba’s former two-time world champion Rafael Alba.
That win set Cunningham up with a semi-final showdown against the Ivory Coast’s Cheick Sallah Cisse, the reigning world champion and an all-too-familiar name to the British camp after his last-second win over Lutalo Muhammad in the 2016 Olympic final.
Muhammad watched from the mixed zone as the pair shared the opening two rounds before a thrilling, see-sawing third ended level and led to Cunningham being advanced into his first major final on the basis of unscored registrations – the number of shots that are too light to register.
If I stay with this, I'll be the king of taekwondo for the next four years, no problem. One fight doesn't define me as a fighter— Caden Cunningham
It was the latest stage of an increasingly impressive career for Cunningham, who rebounded from his injury to win the World Grand Prix title in Italy in 2023, followed by European Games and European titles respectively.
Cunningham continued: “You’ve got to be positive. I’m 21, I tore my ACL not long ago and I’ve got the best physio in the world, I came back very quickly.
“So to qualify for this was hard as it was, to come and beat three world Champions, three Olympic medallists, and then such an amazing fighter like that, it’s a blooming good day.”
Great Britain team-mate Rebecca McGowan missed out on a place on the podium when she was beaten by reigning heavyweight world champion Nafia Kus in their bronze medal match.
McGowan had recovered well from a comprehensive earlier defeat to Uzbekistan’s Svetlana Osipova to bound through the repechage but despite taking the first round, she found her Turkish opponent too tough to crack.
She said: “”In taekwondo the little things make the match. It’s gutting. It’s a little heart-breaking right now.
“Losing the review was a turning point but it’s the sport I chose, the life I chose. At some point I have to deal with it and pick myself up.”
