A contingent of 240- member of Bangladesh, which included 180 athletes and 60 high officials won only two bronze medals in the 19th Asian Games held from September 23 to October 8 at Hangzhou, China.
Bangladesh participated in 17 disciplines, but the team returned with only two bronze medals from the game.
The two bronze medals came from cricket when men’s and women’s team achieved the feat from this event.
Cricket was not included in Jakarta Game in 2018 and Bangladesh came back to the country with empty pocket from that edition.
There was a great chance to win medals from Kabadi but men’s kabaddi team failed to regain the medal they won 36 years back. Women’s team had an opportunity to clinch the bronze in this Game, if they could beat Nepal in the first encounter. But Bangladesh Women’s lost to Nepal 37-24 points.
Archery team also missed a chance to win a medal when the men's team lost to Indonesia in the bronze-medal decider in recurve team event.
Amidst all the disappointment, boxer Selim Hossain reached the quarterfinals. He lost by a big margin in bronze competition when women boxer Jinnat Ferdous lost 5-0 in the second match and out from the race.
Bangladesh fastest man Emranur Rahman, could not reach the final stage in 100 metere sprint. Shooters, who practiced round the year before to go China but all their hard works were in vein.
BOA treasurer and Chef de Mission A. K. Sarkar was very happy to achieve two medals from the game when he said, “Considering our preparation and players skills, we had no bigger expectation from the Games. But we expected that archery, Kabaddi and shooting would perform better in the game but they disappointed.”
Sarkar was pleased to get two medals from the Game considering ability. He told that boxer Selim Hossain moved into semi-final by winning two Games but could not finish well to win medal.
“Archers also reached in semi-final for the first time in the event, it impressive. But we failed to perform well in some of the events that was unexpected,” said A.K. Sarkar.
Men’s football lost to Myanmar by and India by same margin but was very much unfortunate, as we went down to Myanmar conceding an own goal when suffered defat to India by a penalty.
But drawing against China by 0-0 obviously deserved some credits, the host defated Myanmar by 4-0 and India by 5-0.
After the two medals from the 19th edition of the Game, Bangladesh achieved overall 13 medals in the Asian Games. Twelve of those came from Kabaddi and cricket and the other one from boxing.
While Bangladesh performances are frustrated in Asian Games, its neighbours India rose to new heights.
India, who were eighth in the medals tally in the last two editions of the Asian Games, clinched fourth position in Hangzhou with 107 medals -- 28 gold, 38 silver and 41 bronze.
