Golden Moments In Sports: The First Nigerian To Win A World Championship Silver Medal

Over the years, women like Mary Onyali, Chioma Ajunwa and Blessing Okagbare have done Nigeria proud in more ways than one. With more collective medals than we can keep count of, Nigerian women have, in recent times, become a force to reckon with in the nation’s sports industry. Little wonder, a Nigerian woman won Nigeria’s first ever Silver medal at the World Wrestling Championships. Two time Commonwealth Games, Gold medalist, Odunayo Adekuoroye, made history on August 23rd, at the 2017 World Wrestling Championships, in Paris, when she won Silver in the women’s 55kg category.

Having won a Bronze medal at the 2015 edition of the championships in Las Vegas, Adekuoroye, arrived Paris as the world No.1 in the women’s 55kg category, and was the favourite to take home the Gold medal. However, Japan’s Haruna Okuno, pulled quite the stunner on the Nigerian, as she picked a well deserving 5-4 victory in the final round of the women’s 55kg event. Adekuoroye, started off her campaign at the championships, with a 13-9 defeat of Mathilde Riviere, before moving on to the Round of 16, where she squashed Czech Republic’s Lenka Hockova, 10-0. In the quarter final, the Nigerian handed Erkhembayaryn Davaachimeg, an 8-4 defeat, after which she  replicated Hockova’s thrashing on Iryna Kurachkina of Belarus in the semifinal, to book a spot in the final showdown. Despite losing to Okuno, Adekuoroye’s feat at the World Championships made a strong impression on the world, and Nigeria is indeed proud of the amazonian.

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This article was first published on 2nd November 2018 and updated on September 6th, 2019 at 7:47 am

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