At the final of the World Badminton Championships in Glasgow, Japan’s Nozomi Okuhara battled past Indian shuttler PV Sindhu to claim gold. The match was physically demanding for both players as the entire match was peppered with long rallies and an incredible display of power. The final score read 19-21, 22-20, 20-22 in Okuhara’s favour.

It was the longest match in the history of the World Championships because it lasted 110 minutes. It was also Sindhu’s best performance at the World Championships because it was her first appearance in the finals. It was also India’s best ever showing in the Championships because the subcontinent came away with 2 medals, courtesy a bronze from Saina Nehwal.

Okuhara drew first blood but Sindhu fought back to take a 2-1 lead. After exchanging points for a while, she ended up with a 11-5 lead. Okuhara was not going down without a fight and a few rallies later, levelled at 14-14. Then she got on the front foot and took the lead with a score of 18-14. A few costly errors saw Okuhara take the first set 19-21.

In the second set, the 4th seeded Indian, came out swinging and took a 5-1 lead. But once again, Okuhara counterattacked and levelled the score at 12-all. After a few hard shots, the score was level once again at 20-all but Sindhu had other ideas. She bagged 2 crucial points to take the second set.

In the final set, Nozomi took the lead but her opponent got rid of the deficit. Going into a break, PV Sindhu was leading 11-9 but Okuhara levelled once again. At 19-19, Sindhu made an unforced error and handed the advantage to Okuhara, though she levelled, nerves got the better of her and Nozomi got the championship point which she achieved with ease.