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Tunisia’s Fares Ferjani narrowly missed becoming Africa’s first gold medallist at the Paris 2024 Olympics, settling for silver in the men’s individual sabre after a 15-11 defeat by South Korea’s Oh Sanguk at the Grand Palais.
The 27-year-old, seeded 13th, defeated world number one Ziad Elsissy in the semi-finals but couldn’t overcome Oh in the final.
Born in Tunis and now based in New York, Ferjani had previously finished 22nd at Tokyo 2020 and 25th at the Rio 2016 Olympics.
His best senior world stage result was an 8th-place finish at the 2018 World Championships in Wuxi, China.
Ferjani’s silver marks Tunisia’s 16th Olympic medal, adding to its tally of five golds, four silvers and seven bronzes since first competing as an independent nation in Rome in 1960.
Tunisia sent its smallest Olympic delegation in two decades to Paris, with 26 athletes compared to 63 in Tokyo.
In the bronze medal match, top seed Elsissy was defeated 15-12 by Italy’s Luigi Samele.
The 29-year-old Egyptian would have another chance to medal in the team sabre event starting Wednesday.
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