What Opportunities Are Ours
Before embarking on the journey to the Olympic Paris 2024, the Head of Vietnam's Sports Team - Mr. Đặng Hà Việt - shared with the press that: “The Olympic is a competitive arena with intense professional competition among many talented athletes from all countries around the world. In particular, this arena is a competition between major economies. The athletic achievements in many large arenas such as the ASIAD or the Olympic will reflect and evaluate the socio-economic development of a country and the advanced scientific and technological development, investment capacity, and the attention of countries to the field of sports...”.
We set a goal to strive for a medal in this competition. Ultimately, no athlete among the 16 contestants in 11 sports (athletics, swimming, weightlifting, cycling, shooting, archery, badminton, judo, boxing, canoeing, and rowing) won a medal for Vietnamese sports.
At the previous Olympic in Tokyo (Japan) 2020, we had 18 athletes participating and none of them achieved a medal. Thus, at two consecutive Olympics, Vietnamese sports have been “empty-handed” on the most prestigious arena of the world's sports.
Looking at other sports teams in Southeast Asia, the Thai and Philippine teams have won Gold Medals at the Olympic Paris 2024. The Malaysian and Indonesian teams have won medals at Paris this time.
Vietnamese sports are participating in 19 events at the Olympic Paris 2024, which means there are 19 opportunities to compete for medals. We came closest to a Olympic medal this time in the shooting event of the 10m air pistol women. Shooter Trịnh Thu Vinh finished the final round in fourth place, failing to win a medal.
Shooting and archery did not achieve the expected results when Đỗ Thị Ánh Nguyệt, Lê Quốc Phong (archery) were eliminated in the first round of direct competition; Trịnh Văn Vinh (weightlifting) dropped the weight, failing to achieve the final result. 11 Southeast Asian countries have a total of 182 athletes participating in the Olympic Paris 2024 in various sports. Vietnam is the top SEA Games 32 country but has failed to rank among the top 4 Southeast Asian countries in terms of achievement at the ASIAD 19 and Olympic Paris 2024.
Why Should We Be Concerned?
When asked what Vietnamese sports will do to change and improve when competing in the ASIAD or Olympic, sports expert Nguyễn Hồng Minh once expressed: “We need to carefully evaluate each event, each sport that Vietnamese athletes have the ability to compete for high achievements on the world stage. From there, we should invest and focus on specific, key sports rather than spreading out. Of course, this is not just about athletes but also other supporting factors such as nutrition, medicine, training facilities, and training plans...”.
Vietnamese sports have spent 8 years preparing and competing for the Olympic Tokyo 2020 and Olympic Paris 2024. However, the result is still zero in terms of medal achievements. After the Olympic in Japan, the manager once provided analysis to learn from experience and invest again. However, the reality of the competition results at the Olympic Paris 2024 has confirmed that the investment and implementation of high-achieving sports have not been effective.
We have early predicted that the two most promising sports are weightlifting and shooting, which will have opportunities to compete for medals at the Olympic Tokyo 2020 and Olympic Paris 2024, but in return, after the competition, the coaching staff and managers only expressed the familiar sentiment: Regret! Now, the Ministry of Culture, Sports, and Tourism and the Sports Department have had to build a new roadmap for the Olympic Los Angeles (USA) 2028...
