Asiad 20 Diary September 21: Vietnam's Volleyball Stops, Medals Come From Unexpected Places

When the Vietnamese women's volleyball team left the court in Nagoya on September 20, no one cried. That fact may be more telling than the 0-3 scoreline against China. In Asian volleyball, losing to China in the quarterfinals is an outcome written long in advance — like a mathematical equation with no alternative solution. But the strange thing about this Asiad is: on a day volleyball stopped, Vietnam still earned two bronze medals — from teqball and karate kata, two sports few mentioned before the Games. Asiad 20 - the 20th Asian Games held in Aichi-Nagoya (Japan) - opened with its first competition day on September 20. Vietnam's delegation entered with the expectation of "waiting for a mark," as the media framed it. But that mark came from directions completely different from initial predictions. While three shooters carrying "considerable expectations" failed to advance from qualification, and the women's volleyball team - one of Vietnam's most beloved teams - lost 0-3 to China in the quarterfinals, it was teqball (a sport derived from football, played on a curved table) that brought the delegation its first medal: a mixed doubles bronze. Karate kata extended the medal run with another bronze - a medal created through the repechage round, after defeat in the main bracket. Let's talk about volleyball first, because it is the only key team sport of Vietnam that stopped on day one. Structurally, the 0-3 loss was within normal expectations. China ranks in the world's top 10, while Vietnam sits around 30th - a gap built from height, power, and roster depth. But what deserves attention is not the loss itself, but how the team lost. When a team following the Asian school - fast, varied, dependent on perfect first passes - meets an overwhelmingly tall block, the quick-attack system is neutralized almost from the first rallies. No official data from this match is available, but based on my experience following the Vietnamese women's team for years, I can state one thing: the Perfect Pass% is the decisive metric. Passing technique is not something to prove. It is something to understand. When that number drops, Vietnam's entire quick-attack system collapses — attacking options become simple, predictable, and the opponent's block only needs to lock onto two outside hitters. From another angle, the karate kata story at this Asiad reveals a completely different operational model. Every match hides a story. I am just someone who bends down to listen. Vietnam's karate athlete lost to a Japanese opponent in the pool stage, dropped into the repechage - the second-chance mechanism for those who lost to eventual finalists - then defeated South Korean and Singaporean opponents to take bronze. In other words, this medal was born from the format's structure, not from a change in level. That does not diminish its value, but it shows the fundamental difference between two kinds of "marks" a sports delegation can create. And then there is teqball. A new sport on the Asiad program, with three golds awarded in one day - and Thailand took all three. Vietnam has one bronze. The stratification in this new sport is astonishingly fast: on the very first day of a sport newly introduced to the Asiad, it is already clear who invests, who learns, and who is just participating. Teqball has become the new medal equation that Southeast Asia is racing to solve. The counterintuitive point here is: two bronze medals came from low-visibility sports, while the sports that carried expectations - shooting, volleyball - failed to deliver their "mark." Looking at budget structures, this is a worrying signal. A sports system is realizing that a teqball medal is much "cheaper" than a volleyball medal — because volleyball requires a long-term training system, height, power, and decades of construction. Teqball requires a curved table and a few months of adaptation. In the long run, budget allocation can become distorted: cheap sports with fast medals will drain resources from team sports requiring large investment. Vietnam's women's volleyball, having stopped at the Asiad quarterfinals, risks not just losing on court but losing the budget battle after this tournament. I have learned that medals can come from where no one expects, and failure where people expect most is the most normal thing. Vietnam's women's volleyball lost to China as an inevitability of the Asian hierarchy. The decisive question for the LA 2028 cycle is not why they lost to China, but whether the team can beat South Korea or Thailand in a knockout match. That is the only "mark" worth waiting for.