January 12, 2022: From Lionel Messi picking up the World Cup trophy for Argentina, to Rafael Nadal winning the Australian Open, 2022 has been one of the most eventful years in terms of sporting memories!
Sports can bring people together like no other festival can, and 2022 will stand as a witness of collecting the most incredible sporting memories for fans to cherish for the rest of their lives. Let us revisit the top sporting moments of 2022!
JANUARY 2022
Rafael Nadal winning the Australian Open
Ahead of the Australian Open, the air in Melbourne was surrounded with stories and updates about Novak Djokovic's vaccination status. The gossip, however, was soon forgotten once the real tournament started.
Rafael Nadal was all set to add a new feather to his cap with a victory on his mind. Quite heroically, he took down Russian athlete Daniel Medvedev in an all-time classical manner in the finale, even after losing the first two sets.
He recovered to defeat the latter 2–6, 6–7 (5), 6–4, 6–4, 7–5 after five hours and 24 minutes and registered a victory in the Australian Open by adding the 21st grand slam title to his name. His masterstrokes and the historical match have already been scripted down in the sporting manuscripts for fans to cherish for the rest of their lives.
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FEBRUARY
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Shaun White bidding farewell to the Olympic run
The American King of Slopes, our favourite snowboarding legend, five-time Olympian and a three-time Olympic gold medallist in halfpipe boarding, Shaun White wrapped up his final Olympic run after A
announcing his retirement from the games.
Mr White has claimed almost every thing that there is to claim in his Olympic run of over 27 years, and also holds the world record for the most X Games gold medals and most Olympic gold medals by any snowboarder ever.
His last run stretched across the men's halfpipe event, very narrowly finishing behind bronze medallist Jan Scherrer of Switzerland.
- India winning their maiden Thomas cup badminton trophy
LLd by Lakshya Sen, HS Prannoy, Kidambi Srikanth and Satwiksairaj Rankireddy, the Indian men's badminton team scripted history in 2022 after lifting the Thomas cup for the first time ever! In the last 31 years, the badminton team only came back home empty-handed.
Last year in Bangkok, Thailand, the Indian team finished just behind Chinese Taipei in the group stages to qualify for the knockouts. HS Prannoy pulled off back-to-back wins both in the quarter-finals and semifinals to help India beat Malaysia and Denmark respectively, both by 3–2 margins.
In the finale, they were against arguably the most successful team in the history of the competition with 14 titles, Indonesia. Unfazed by all the pressure, the Indian shuttlers produced a phenomenal performance and won the decider 3–0 to clinch their maiden Thomas cup title.
- Tiger Woods waving goodbye at St Andrews
- July: As tears rolled down his face, a charming legend walked down the Swilcan Bridge on day two of the 150th Open, garnering applause from players on the adjacent fairway, the 1st, and the galleries, all on their feet.
- When the tournament makes a return to St Andrews in 2030, Mr. Tiger Woods will not be playing again by his own admission.
- After claiming 15 major titles, including two at the home of golf, recovering from serious injuries and controversies, Woods provided all the golf fans with one of the most emotional golfing moments through his emotional farewell at St Andrews.
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- Neeraj Chopra winning the Diamond league
India's golden boy Neeraj Chopra kept his dream run intact even in 2022 after missing the first half of the season. He stormed back into his game again and clinched a silver medal at the Paavo Nurmi Games to set a national record.
He clinched another silver at the World Athletics Championship 2022 in Oregon. After missing the Commonwealth Games in Birmingham due to an injury, he made a comeback again with a stellar campaign in the Diamond League.
After finishing second in the Stockholm leg and first in the Lausanne leg, which was also the first-ever victory by an Indian in the tournament, he qualified for the Diamond League final in Zürich.
He became, eventually, the first Indian to win a Diamond League trophy, after setting his personal best record of 89.94 m throw at the Stockholm meet.
- Max Verstappen dominating Formula 1 to become a two-time world championship
Our Red Bull star clinched his second world championship title after smashing several Formula 1 records during the 2022 season. Max Verstappen not only defended his 2021 drivers title, but made a comeback with 15 victories in total, along with three podium finishes and a total score of 454 points.
After several years, Red Bull claimed their first constructors title after finishing with 200+ points, just ahead of Ferrari.
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England winning the men's ICC T20 cricket World Cup
November: The English team was missing the chances of key players like Jofra Archer, Jonny Bairstow and Reese Topley before they headed to Australia to play for the T20 ICC men's Cricket World Cup.
They had only lifted the trophy once in 2010 in the Caribbean and even this time, the campaign was not all smooth sailing for them. After defeating India in the semi-final, they set up an exhilarating finale against Pakistan, compelling the latter to stick to a low score.
The winning runs came off the bat of English superstar Ben Stokes, as England became the first team to hold the ODI and the T20 World Cup title simultaneously.
December: Balaram Stack and Molly Picklum clinching the 2022 Pipe Masters at Banzai pipeline
Two new champions were crowned in the most prestigious surf contest of four-to-six foot surfs at the 2022 Pipe Masters. Focusing mostly on Hawaiian performers, the competition featured 60 male and female athletes, running independently of the World Surf League Championship Tour, with the introduction of a new leaderboard style format.
In leaderboard style format, surfers compete in three non-elimination heat rounds throughout the tournament. A no-priority system was incorporated by the judges and the decisions were made fairly based on grounds like turns, airs and barrels. In the non-elimination heat rounds, the best three wave scores were counted towards the total heat score.
31-year-old East Coast surfer Balaram Stack clinched the reward in the men's final after defeating Griffin Colapinto, Kaulana Ap and João Chianca. Australian surfer Molly Picklum, on the other hand, defeated Bettylou Sakura-Johnson, Caity Simmers and Carissa Moore, in the women's final.
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December: Dane Dawkins winning the first Jockeys’ Championship
The last part of 2022 mostly focused on the jockeys championship, involving Dane Dawkins, and defending champion Anthony Thomas all set for a 2022 grand equestrian finale for the last three races of the year, December 26, December 27 and December 31.
Dawkins pulled ahead with 100 winners after the first three races, four ahead of Thomas with 96 winners. The finish was expected to be a thriller already!
On the final race day, Dawkins ended his performance with 103 and three winners, while Thomas rode two winners and finished on 96. This handed Dawkins his first championship title!
Lionel Messi winning the Qatar World Cup
36 years. 36 years was all that it took for the Argentines to patiently wait for before clinching the World Champions title again.
After starting off their campaign with a disappointing loss to the Saudi Arabian team, the world had already assumed Lionel Messi's last appearance at the World Cup would not be a desirable one, to say the least.
That, and the fact that arguably the greatest player of all time became the first footballer to score in the last 16, the quarter-final, semi-final and the final match in the 2022 World Cup, was a journey to live for.
After defeating France 4–2 on penalties, Argentina achieved the greatest World Cup victory in probably one of the biggest football finals one has witnessed so far. Lionel Messi walked away with the golden ball, making sure that Argentine legend Diego Maradona is sharing this triumph with them, smiling and shedding tears of joy somewhere up there.