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World Athletics Championship (WAC) 2023 concluded on Sunday (August 27). India ended at the joint 18th position in the medals tally with one Gold medal to their name thanks to their 25-year-old Javelin thrower Neeraj Chopra. However, there is an interesting connection of Javelin with cricket. This is an interesting fact for the fans that only one cricketer in the history has ever won a medal in the World Ahtletics Championship.
The cricketer is Sunette Viljoen from South Africa who featured in one Test and 17 ODIs for her country. Sunette is a champion in Javelin as she won the Silver medal in Daegu in 2011, and bronze in Beijing in 2015. Perhaps, she is also won the silver medal at Rio Olympics in 2016. Coming back to her cricket career, Viljoen had scored 88 runs in the only Test she played while she went on to muster 198 runs and pick five wickets in her short ODI career.
Interestingly, she had targetted to return to cricket after consistent injuries ended her dream to represent South Africa in Tokyo Olympics. She joined the Titans team in domestic cricket as well and smashed an unbeaten 160 off just 123 balls on debut in January 2022. She was eyeing to make it to South Africa’s T20 World Cup 2023 squad but her efforts didn’t bear fruits.
Coming back to cricket’s connection to World Athletics Championships, Rai Benjamin won the bronze medal in Men’s 400 metres hurdles. He is the son of former West Indian fast bowler Winston Benjamin. Moreover, Australia’s left-arm pace bowler Mitchell Starc’s brother Brandon Starc was also part of the Championships this time around. He finished at the eighth position in Men’s High Jump.
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