nagoya
\nThe Asian Games in Japan closed on Sunday after a fortnight lit up by record-smashing young stars but marred by mishaps, mediocre crowds and accusations of mismanagement.
\nMore than 17,000 athletes and officials, a bigger number than the Olympics, descended on Nagoya and Aichi Prefecture for the continent\u2019s premier sporting spectacular.
\nChinese swimming sensation Yu Zidi, just 13, stole the show with three gold medals, all in Games-record times.
\nShe looks set to be a major medal threat at the Los Angeles 2028 Olympics.
\nThe schoolgirl was named a Games MVP to cap an extraordinary showing that saw her scorch to gold in the 200m butterfly and do the 200m-400m individual medley double.
\nFor all that, the shy teenager said: \u201cI don\u2019t think I am what people describe as a prodigy.\u201d
\nAlso in the pool, Japanese swimmer Shin Ohashi, only 17, smashed the men\u2019s 200m breaststroke world record to delight the home crowd.
\nIn athletics, where rain tumbled down over several days, the 20-year-old Thai sprinter Puripol Boonson did the 100m-200m double and was named men\u2019s MVP.
\nOn a dry evening, a celebratory closing ceremony full of colour and song saw Japan hand over hosting duties to Doha 2030.
\n\u2018Failure grade\u2019
\nTop officials were on the defensive up until the last minute.
\nOlympic Council of Asia director general Husain Al-Musallam said \u201cnumbers are facts\u201d, pointing to 50 world records broken at the Games after they opened on September 19.
\n\u201cThe athletes cannot perform if they don\u2019t sleep good, the athletes cannot perform if they don\u2019t have good transportation,\u201d he said.
\nThis 20th edition of the Games, which were first contested in 1951, did not have a traditional athletes\u2019 village in a bid to save money.
\nInstead, participants were housed in wooden temporary units, on the cruise ship Costa Serena and in hotels.
\nOrganisers said this was a template for future multi-sports events.
\nBut it came with issues, with some teams complaining the units were too cramped and the beds too short.
\nMore than that, the ballooning numbers of athletes and officials meant there were not enough beds for everyone.
\nOne Thai Olympic official told AFP it was \u201clike musical chairs\u201d trying to get somewhere to sleep.
\nThe sport, including a blockbuster cricket final won by India against arch-rivals Pakistan, did sometimes shine through.
\nNorth Korean weightlifter Ri Song Gum, a 140cm (4ft 7in) pocket powerhouse, set three new world marks in one day for gold.
\nBut problems kept coming, including organisers playing North Korea\u2019s national anthem for the South Korean hockey team.
\nThere were athletes\u2019 buses that did not turn up when they should, or did not arrive at all.
\nTwo teams were sent to the wrong venue, delaying a volleyball match.
\n\u201cIf I were to give them a grade, it would be an F,\u201d Ryu Seung-min, president of the Korean Sport and Olympic Committee, said.
\nGames organisers were on the back foot as well over attendances, with the opening ceremony taking place in front of thousands of empty seats.
\nAt the women\u2019s football semi-final between hosts Japan and South Korea, there were 998 spectators in a 50,000 stadium.
\nBoy history-maker
\nJapanese Olympic Committee president Seiko Hashimoto admitted that \u201cthere were many problems\u201d, but said the country wants to host more international events in future.
\nShe said bad weather had turned some spectators off, but was eager to point out that some sports were well attended.
\nAbout 30,000 saw South Korea beat Japan 1-0 to clinch men\u2019s football gold, although the occasion was tarnished somewhat when the South Korean flag failed to go up in the victory ceremony.
\nThe hosts finished with 83 golds, a distant second in the medals table behind China with 169.
\nJapan\u2019s tally included gold for Yuki Kurihara, who won an eSports competition aged 11, making him the youngest Games champion in history.
\nSeveral sports with ambitions of making the Olympics made their debut, including padel, MMA and virtual taekwondo.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
nagoya The Asian Games in Japan closed on Sunday after a fortnight lit up by record-smashing young stars but marred by mishaps, mediocre crowds and accusations of mismanagement. More than 17,000 athletes and officials, a bigger number than the Olympics, descended on Nagoya and Aichi Prefecture for the continent\u2019s premier sporting spectacular. Chinese swimming sensation …<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4,"featured_media":103889,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-103882","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103882","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=103882"}],"version-history":[{"count":1,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103882\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":103907,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/103882\/revisions\/103907"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/103889"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=103882"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=103882"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/nabanews.pk\/en\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=103882"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}