A long-awaited meeting between javelin stars Neeraj Chopra and Arshad Nadeem is confirmed as the Olympic gold medallists face each other at the World Athletics Championship 2025 in Japan.
India’s Chopra and Pakistan’s Nadeem have qualified for the men’s javelin final on Thursday.
Here’s what you need to know about the event:
What time is the javelin final involving Arshad Nadeem and Neeraj Chopra?
The final will begin at 10:23 GMT on Thursday.
Where is the javelin final of the World Athletics Championship?
The Japan National Stadium in Tokyo is hosting the track and field championship.
Which athletes have qualified for the javelin final?
Twelve athletes will participate in the final.
The starting list for the final includes:
- Julian Weber (Germany)
- Anderson Peters (Grenada)
- Arshad Nadeem (Pakistan)
- Neeraj Chopra (India)
- Julius Yego (Kenya)
- Curtis Thompson (USA)
- Cameron McEntyre (Australia)
- David Wegner (Poland)
- Sachin Yadav (India)
- Rumesh Tharanga Pathirage (Sri Lanka)
- Jakub Vadlejch (Czech Republic)
- Keshorn Walcott (Trinidad and Tobago)
How does the qualification process work?
All competing athletes have to undergo the qualifying round, also known as the heats, where they get three throws each.
At the World Athletics Championships, athletes with a throw of 84.5 metres (277.23 feet) or above entered the final directly and took up the first seven spots. The other five qualified on the basis of the best throws amongst the rest.
The number of contesting athletes was 37, who were divided into two heats, A and B.
Did Chopra and Nadeem compete against each other in the qualifying round?
No. Chopra was placed in Heat A, and Nadeem in B.
Who are the top-ranked men’s javelin athletes?
Germany’s Weber is the top-ranked javelin athlete, followed by Chopra and Peters.
Trinidad and Tobago’s Walcott is ranked fourth, and Kenya’s Yego is fifth.
What’s the prize money for the javelin final?
The winner will bag $70,000, while the second-placed athlete will be awarded $35,000, and the third-placed finisher will earn $22,000.
Why isn’t Arshad Nadeem ranked?
World Athletics rankings are achieved by collecting points at WA competitions of varying rankings across the athletics season.
Nadeem has been unable to compete at most WA competitions, largely due to financial constraints, and has not earned enough points to be ranked among the world’s best.
Who is Arshad Nadeem?
Nadeem hails from a small village near the city of Mian Channu in southern Punjab state, about 300km (186 miles) southwest of the Pakistani megacity of Lahore.
The third of seven siblings, Nadeem grew up in a household that struggled to make ends meet. His father, Muhammad Ashraf, a retired construction worker, was the sole breadwinner.
As a child, Nadeem towered over his classmates. By the time he was 14, he was almost six feet (183cm) tall.
Cricket was his first love. “I used to be a very good bowler and would participate in a lot of tournaments,” Nadeem told Al Jazeera in 2024.
His first international outing as a javelin thrower came at the 2016 South Asian Games in India, where he competed against the then-emerging Indian star Neeraj Chopra.
Nadeem, who went into the tournament with a niggle in his throwing elbow, still managed a throw of 78.33 metres (257 feet), winning his first international medal, a bronze, with Chopra securing gold.
He would go on to collect more regional medals, before making the world sit up and take notice at the Paris Olympics 2024, where he broke the Olympic record to win gold – Pakistan’s first track and field medal in its history.
Who is Neeraj Chopra?
Chopra’s journey to the top was not easy either. Growing up in the village of Chandra in the northern Indian state of Haryana, the young Neeraj was regularly bullied over his weight. By age 11, he was already 80kg (176 pounds), at which point his father suggested he join a local gym.
It was there that he first took up athletics, with the javelin quickly becoming his favourite discipline.
“I really liked the javelin, especially how it flew, but I also watched so many videos of Jan Zelezny, the world record holder from the Czech Republic, so I watched so many videos of him and I really liked his technique and his attitude in competition,” he told Al Jazeera in 2023.
By the age of 25, Chopra had won Olympic and world titles.
Chopra’s gold at the 2021 Olympic Games in Tokyo, too, was the first Olympic gold in track and field for his country.
What is Neeraj Chopra’s personal best throw?
The Indian athlete landed a 90.23-metre (296.03 feet) throw at the Doha Diamond League on May 16.
What is Arshad Nadeem’s personal best throw?
Nadeem broke the Olympic record with a throw of 92.97 metres (305.02 feet) at the Paris Olympics on August 8, 2024.
How many medals has Neeraj Chopra won?
The 27-year-old has collected the following medals:
- Olympic Games: gold (2020), silver (2024)
- World Athletics Championship: gold (2023), silver (2022)
- Asian Athletics Championships: gold (2017)
- Commonwealth Games: gold (2018)
- Asian Games: gold (2018, 2022)
- South Asian Games: gold (2019)
How many medals has Arshad Nadeem won?
Nadeem’s tally includes:
- Olympic Games: gold (2024)
- World Athletics Championship: silver (2023)
- Commonwealth Games: gold (2022)
- Asian Athletics Championships: gold (2025)
- Asian Games: bronze (2018)
- South Asian Games: gold (2019), bronze (2016)
Are Arshad Nadeem and Neeraj Chopra friends?
In the past, the South Asian athletes have been vocal in lending support to one another despite the fraught relationship between the countries.
After the World Athletics Championship final in 2023, silver-medal-winner Nadeem said he was delighted for Chopra’s gold medal and that both countries finished on the podium.
Once the medals were handed out and the athletes were celebrating on the track, Chopra asked Nadeem to join him for a photo. They then stood close with their arms around each other.
The frequent words of encouragement and appreciation exchanged between Chopra, who won Olympic gold at Tokyo 2021, and Nadeem, who bagged gold at Paris 2024, rendered both the darlings of social media and the face of a rare cross-border friendship.
What happened between Arshad Nadeem and Neeraj Chopra?
Following the aerial and military conflict between India and Pakistan in May, Chopra said it would be difficult to maintain the same friendly relationship with Nadeem.
“It will not be like it was before [the recent escalations],” Chopra told Al Jazeera on May 15, when asked about the repercussions of the tensions on his friendship with Nadeem.
“I never had a very deep friendship with him, but we were always respectful towards each other,” he added.
Following the four-day conflict in May, Chopra faced intense social media backlash for inviting Nadeem to the May 24 Neeraj Chopra Classic javelin event in India.
The invitation was extended before the attack and was declined by Nadeem, citing his preparations for the May 27-31 Asian Athletics Championship in South Korea.
Chopra’s eponymous event was eventually postponed in the wake of the cross-border conflict, but not before the 27-year-old Indian athlete released a statement on April 25, saying Nadeem’s participation at the meet was “completely out of the question.”
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