The Croatian fans were put on the edge of their seats at the Arena Zagreb as Cvjetko and Matić fought out a tense tussle that was eventually decided in golden score.

There was little between the two fighters as they cancelled each other out, receiving two penalties each.

The tempo lifted in golden score as Cvjetko went close with an ura-nage before Matić responded with an uchi-mata attempt.

With four minutes gone, Cvjetko produced the decisive move as she pulled off a ken-ken-o-uchi-gari to send Matić crashing on her back for the ippon.

It was a big moment for Cvjetko as she looks to beat Matić for a place in Croatia’s team for next year’s Olympics in Paris.

Anka Pogačnik of Slovenia and Irene Pedrotti of Italy gained the bronze medals.

Britain’s Lucy Renshall delivered as top seed to take women’s under-63kg gold after overcoming the challenge of Kim Ji-su of South Korea in the final.

The six-time Grand Slam winner was under pressure as she fell two shidos to one down before receiving a blow to the nose following a clash of heads.

After receiving treatment, Renshall, sporting a bandage over her nose, remained composed as Kim buckled, receiving two more shidos to lose in the seventh minute of golden score.

Austria’s Lubjana Piovesana and Mexico’s Prisca Awiti Alcaraz sealed the other places on the podium after winning their respective bronze-medal matches.

Israel’s Sagi Muki captured his fourth Grand Prix titles of his career and first since 2019 when he defeated Medickson Del Orbe Cortorreal of the Dominican Republic in the men’s under-81kg final.

Del Orbe Cortorreal came out firing in the gold-medal match, scoring a waza-ari courtesy of a o-soto-gari to ura-nage.

Muki responded superbly, producing back-to-back waza-aris to clinch the title.

The Israeli and Del Orbe Cortorreal were joined on the podium by bronze medallists Mykhailo Svidrak of Ukraine and Askerbiy Gerbekov, a Russian-born judoka who switched his nationality to Bahrain in 2019.

Spain’s Jorge Cano Garcia produced the shock of the night when he defeated Algeria’s second seed Messaoud Redouane Dris in the men’s under-73kg final.

The world number 136 stunned Dris with a o-soto-gari to score a sensational ippon inside the opening 90 seconds.

It was the biggest result in Cano Garcia’s career with his previous best showing being a seventh place finish at the Tashkent Grand Prix in 2018.

The bronze medals were won by Martin Hojak of Slovenia and Kazakhstan’s Bakhitzhan Abdurakhmanov.

Competition is due to conclude tomorrow with medals set to be awarded in the men’s under-90kg, men’s under-100kg, men’s over-100kg, women’s under-78kg and women’s over-78kg categories.