I hope he can medal here, he has a nice future. I don't really know too much about him, but he has had nice success already and arguably could have beat Sadulaev. I had no idea that he had previously wrestled at 125kg, too.
I don't know too much about the other country's lineups, I don't know who at 97kg will be a challenge. Unless Azerbaijan and Turkey have strong guys, I am unsure.
I am looking forward to see Naifonov try out at the European games. He is super young, maybe 20.
Yeah hes a beast. Big, strong, very solid technique. I really cant overstate the depth of that division when he won the Yarygin, its incredible:
Gadisov- World champ, world silver, Olympian, 2x European champ, Euro Bronze, Yarygin champ, University World champ, junior world champ.
Boltukaev- World bronze, Yarygin champ, Eauropean champ, 2x Yarygin Silver, Olympian, Russian Nationals Gold.
Gatsalov- 8 world/Olympic medals, 6 of them Gold. 3x Euro champ, and won pretty much every other type of world championship there is (military, junior, world cup)
Yuri Belonovski- University World champ, Euro champ, ton of medals from the Yarygin, Euros, etc.
Georgi Ketoev- World champion, world and Olympic bronze, junior world champ, etc.
Pavlo Olejnik- multi world/euro medalist
etc etc etc there were so many beasts.
As for this years Euro's, I don't know whos going but as you said Azerbaijan has a junior world champ wrestling well at 97 kilos. Ketoev, who I mentioned above is repping Armenia now and active again. The Georgian, Odikadze, is always good but shouldn't be a problem for Baitsaev at this point. Saritov is repping Romania now and has an Olympic medal to go with his world bronze he earned while wrestling for Russia. The Bulgarian who placed 3rd at Europeans last year is a former world champ. So there is definitely some stiff competition for Baitsaev but he can win it for sure.
