England's Nick Matthew: 'Retaining gold medal is best moment of my life'

Nick Matthew has described winning his second successive men's singles gold medal at the Commonwealth Games as "the best moment of [his] life".

The 34-year-old, who underwent knee surgery a little over a month ago, beat fellow Team England competitor James Willstrop 3-2 at the Scotstoun Sports Campus in Glasgow earlier today.

"What a battle. I take my hat off to James, what we've both been through the last few weeks, to put on a final like that," Matthew told BBC Sport. "I was so edgy with my drop-shots throughout the whole game. I felt like I was hitting them with a different racket.

"My coach told me just to hack it to the back, to resort to old-fashioned caveman squash, and that's what I did. Five weeks ago I was on a hospital bed having just woken up from the anaesthetic with throbbing pain in my body.

"How the medics have done it - they need to retire now because it can't get better than that. I better enjoy this for the next two weeks because my wife is expecting a baby. This is the best moment of my life but I'm sure they'll be an even better moment in a few weeks."

Matthew also won gold in the doubles event at the 2010 Commonwealths in Delhi.