Pakistan’s Arshad Nadeem emerged victorious at the men’s javelin throw final at the Paris Olympics, beating India’s reigning Olympic and world champion Neeraj Chopra.
Arshad had a fantastic night at the Stade de France. He bettered an Olympic record that had stood for 16 years, not once but twice. The first — a throw of 92.97m in his second throw of the competition ended it. The second of 91.79m in his final attempt put the final exclamation mark on a near-flawless performance. This is Pakistan’s first-ever gold medal in track and field.
Neeraj performed well as well. In the qualification round he produced his biggest throw of the season. He improved on that in his second throw of the final with 89.45m. That earned him a silver medal. Anderson Peters of Grenada took the bronze with a throw of 88.54 m. The standard of the competition was incredible, with Czechia’s Jakub Vadlejch finishing fourth (88.50m) and Kenya’s Julius Yego (87.70m) taking the fifth place.
Script and production: V Nivedita
