Neeraj Chopra shows promising signs on injury return in Doha, but still has catching up to do

Neeraj Chopra’s opening event of the 2026 season had a lot in common with his final appearance in 2025. Both events witnessed the former Olympic and world champion finish outside the top two, something that Chopra had not achieved across 26 previous events, going all the way back to 2021.

Additionally, his best throw in the two events was fairly similar. However, his best effort of 84.03m at the World Athletics Championships in Tokyo last year and his 85.69m throw at the Doha Diamond League meet on Friday couldn’t be more different.

Back in September, Chopra had arrived in Tokyo as the defending world champion, only to finish an underwhelming eighth out of 12 competitors, having competed while carrying a back injury.

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A promising comeback in Doha

On Friday, Chopra’s first throw in nine months was a foul. The two-time Olympic medallist, however, showed gradual improvement thereafter, registering 82.77m in his next attempt before breaching the 85-metre mark in the third. He reduced his intensity in his fourth attempt, which measured 83.45m before signing off with an ‘X’ against his name in the fifth.

Chopra’s performance in the Qatari capital on Friday was not enough for him to secure a top-two, or even a top-three finish.

However, the fact that he managed to throw 85-plus in his first event in nine months on his comeback from a long injury layoff suggests that he may be close to regaining his old form and consistency, one that had helped him rule the sport in the first half of this decade. It also helped that Chopra qualified for next month's Commonwealth Games in Glasgow in the process.

Friday’s event also marked the beginning of a new partnership for the star athlete from Haryana. Chopra, after all, had parted ways with legendary coach Jan Zelezny in January and joined hands with Jai Chaudhary, his first coach, who had introduced him to the basics of the sport in Panipat.

And while Chopra’s decision to reunite with his former coach hasn’t resulted in a podium finish right away, Friday’s performance indicates that things might be on the right track at the moment.

Another South Asian breakout star stands in Chopra’s way

At the same time, the Doha leg of the Diamond League and other recent events have served Chopra and his team a reminder that the level of competition has only become more intense in the months that have gone by.

The top-three in Friday’s event, after all, did not include Keshorn Walcott, the veteran Trinidadian star who had won gold at the 2012 London Olympics and was crowned world champion for the first time in his career last year. Grenada’s Anderson Peters and USA’s Curtis Thompson, who had finished second and third respectively behind him at the World Championships, had a similar result in Doha on Friday.

Sri Lanka’s Rumesh Tharanga Pathirage won the event with a stellar throw of 88.68m in his fourth attempt, continuing his red-hot form this month after winning the Rome DL meet with a stunning throw of 92.62m – which made him only the fourth Asian to breach the 90m-mark.

Pathirage was among the participants at the inaugural Neeraj Chopra Classic in Bengaluru last year, finishing third with a best effort of 84.34m. Chopra, however, had backed him as a star in the making back then, describing him as someone who would be at “many more podiums” in the future, and the fast bowler-turned-javelin star certainly has lived up to that billing a year later.

Can Chopra defend Asian Games title in September?

The men’s javelin throw event at the 2022 Hangzhou Asian Games was virtually a two-horse race between Chopra and Kishore Jena and the two Indians predictably won gold and silver with best efforts of 88.88m and 87.54m respectively.

A lot has happened in men’s javelin since then. Not only has the sport witnessed a boom in India in the years that have gone by since Chopra’s historic gold at the 2020 Tokyo Olympics, the javelin fever has also spread to neighbouring countries Pakistan and Sri Lanka, which also happen to be cricket-mad nations.

Neeraj Chopra had backed Sri Lanka's Rumesh Pathirage as a future javelin star when the two had competed together at the inaugural Neeraj Chopra Classic in Bengaluru last year. Reuters

Arshad Nadeem would go on to shatter the Olympic record in Paris two years ago with a monster 92.97m throw. And now Pathirage has won two Diamond League meets in the span of two weeks, establishing himself as possibly the best athlete in the discipline at the global level, not just in the subcontinent.

So while Chopra did show promise of regaining his old form in Doha on Friday, he has a lot of catching up to do if he is to successfully defend his Asian Games crown at the upcoming Aichi-Nagoya Games.

It was in Japan in September last year that Chopra had hit the lowest point of his career so far. With Chaudhary by his side, he will be hoping for a vastly different experience when he returns to the country exactly a year later.