It was a successful weekend for Osaka Kwai Judo Club as they brought home five medals from the Strathkelvin Mon, Kyu and Dan Open.

A British Judo event, the competition took place at St Maurice’s High School in Cumbernauld on Sunday afternoon with Osaka Kwai travelling with six young judoka.

Slightly different from Osaka’s usual tournament routine where the kids are sorted into different age groups, the Strathkelvin event had all kids aged between eight and 12 in the same category, with a number of different weight classes.

The club suffered an unfortunate start to the day when Ruth Gray picked up an injury in her warm up session before bravely battling to carry on in the competition, showing grit and determination to continue before being forced to withdraw after her first fight. The youngster is now looking to put the weekend behind her as she sets her sights on her next competition.

Read more: Final flourish for Dumbarton's Osaka Kwai judo club

Next up was Skye Kane and Liam Foy who did well to bounce back from defeats in their opening fights. Both judokas showed tremendous courage to move on from the initial set backs with Skye going on to win a well-deserved silver for the club’s first medal of the afternoon and Liam picking up a fantastic bronze.

Things were looking up now for Osaka Kwai as Joe Butler bravely fought his way to the gold medal match, earning himself an excellent silver with a big performance in his final match.

Kieran Foy, 15, returned to judo after a seven year absence and fought extremely well against larger and older opponents to win a silver medal with the small margin between winning and losing gold medals there for everyone to see.

Calum Connelly, also 15, fought well in an unusual round-robin format of four with the competitors unable to be separated after their opening bouts. This led to a further fight-off between three judoka with Calum showing great maturity and determination to get his mind back into competition mode after thinking his day was over before eventually taking gold in an extremely tough category.

The club now have a well-earned beak from competitive action before getting set for an exciting April that will see them compete in Ireland.