India's champion track and field athlete Neeraj Chopra won a silver in the men's javelin event at the Paris Olympics after producing his season-best throw of 89.45m. Neeraj was in contention for gold as he came into Paris as the defending champion, however, Pakistan's Arshad Nadeem produced a spectacular 92.97m throw to end the Indian's hopes.
Reflecting on what transpired Neeraj revealed that his battle with injury (adductor niggle) created a roadblock and prevented him from giving his best.
"Winning gold at the Tokyo Olympics was the stuff of dreams," Neeraj told India TV in an exclusive interview after the event in Paris. "I realised my dream of winning an Olympic gold in Tokyo. I competed at several events including the Asian Games, and the Diamond League leading into the Paris Olympics."
"Coming into Paris I knew that I had to defend my title. However, my injury (adductor niggle) acted as a roadblock in my title defence. Nonetheless, I am pleased with my effort in the final event. After my second throw (89.45m), I was confident of pulling off a better throw in the remaining attempts but that couldn't happen.
Now, the failure to breach the 90m mark is going to stick with me and I have to work a way out to get there. I am planning to sit down with my team and prepare a roadmap to get there (scale the 90m mark) eventually," he added.
Watch Neeraj Chopra's exclusive interview:
Neeraj entered the event in Paris as the favourite to win gold and would have become only the fifth man to do so in the men's javelin Olympic history. However, a gigantic throw by Arshad not only helped him shatter the all-time Olympic record, it also allowed him to take a comfortable lead which turned out to be decisive in the end.
"Arshad and I have been competing at global events since 2016 and this is the first time he has defeated me in a tournament.
"I think we should embrace the fact that you can't shine or outshine everyone always in a sporting event. While we as athletes work really hard towards producing favourable outcomes, there are a lot of things that play a factor in it, like injuries and how you perform on that given day.
"Today was not my day and he performed really well. However, there will be many more opportunities in the foreseeable future where we will be up against each other again. Overall, the medal event was evenly contested," Neeraj mentioned.
Neeraj also revealed that Arshad's massive throw did shatter the hopes of a few contenders but he was composed and focused on beating the mark set by the Pakistani athlete.
"After Arshad registered a throw of 92.97m, one of the competitors said that the competition was done already. But I was unfazed and focused on going past Arshad's mark.
"Arshad was able to maintain the right technique and it helped him execute better. I, on the other hand, had my own struggles and a lot of my energy didn't quite translate into my throws. I tried to alter my run-up as well but it couldn't make any difference," he concluded.
