‘Fantastic Four’ keeps Paris hopes alive

MANILA, Philippines — From 10 brave souls, it’s down to the “Fantastic Four” composed of Nesthy Petecio, Carlo Paalam, Rogen Ladon and Aira Villegas.

Showing iron will and brave hearts, the fearsome foursome pulled off huge victories in the World Qualification Tournament in Busto Arsizio, Italy Friday and kept the fire burning in their desire to clinch berths to the Paris Olympics in July.

Petecio, the Tokyo Games silver medalist and the leader of the pack, smashed German Nancy Canan Tas to submission with a 5-0 victory that catapulted her straight to quarterfinals of the women’s 57-kilogram class.

There, the former world champion from Santa Cruz, Davao del Sur will battle Dutch Maud Van der Toorn, who was equally impressive in a 5-0 win over Spaniard Jennifer Fernandez Romero. Only the finalists in their division will book tickets to Paris.

Paalam, also a Tokyo silver winner and who drew an opening-round bye, booked a 3-1 triumph over Mexican Andrey Bonilla in surging to the round-of-16 in the men’s 57kg.

Unlike Petecio, the Cagayan de Oro native only needs to advance to the semis to make the Paris cut, needing just two more wins including one against Turkmenistan’s Shukur Ovesov, a 3-2 winner over Iran’s Daniyal Shahbakhsh, in the Last 8.

Also needing just two wins are Villegas, who eked out a tight 3-2 result over Canadian Mckenzie Wright in the women’s 50kg, and Ladon, who advanced to the men’s 51kg round-of-16 following his second-round stoppage of Moroccan Mortaji a few days back.