It was only a matter of turning up for India's star javelin thrower Neeraj Chopra and the gold medal was his for the taking. The U-20 World Junior Championship gold medalist threw his spear across 88.06m in his third attempt to comfortable clinch the yellow metal in his maiden Asian Games. Silver medalist Qizhen Liu of China was a good six metres off at 82.22m, while third-placed Nadeem Arshad of Pakistan could only manage 80.75m. None of the other competitors in the 13-member final field, except China's fourth-placed Qun Ma (80.46m), managed to touch the 80m mark.

Chopra was happy, however, to have surpassed his personal best of 87.43m in the bargain, a mark he had achieved at the prestigious IAAF Diamond League in Doha in May. "I was getting a good carry today, so I was aiming for the Asian Games record (89.15m by China's Qinggang Zhao) but couldn't get it. I'm happy I set a new national record," said the young champion, who has no time to celebrate as he has another IAAF Diamond League to participate in — only around 48 hours from now.