24-22: The Game Won and the Game Lost for Vietnamese Badminton at the Asian Games

The second game stretched to 24-22. That score stayed on the board longer than any other game that day, and in that stretch Nguyen Thuy Linh took a game off the world No.4 women's singles player, Chen Yu Fei. The third game closed at 12-21. The first six points of the decider already told most of the rest of the story. On the same day, in men's singles, Nguyen Hai Dang went through two matches with two opposite faces: a 21-6, 21-6 win over Odilzhon Abdurakhmanov, then a 16-21, 14-21 loss to Kunlavut Vitidsarn. I sat down after the session and wrote every score into my notebook. In a sport where every rally can be counted, emotion has to arrive after the data, not before.

The Asian Games is a multi-sport event where medals are counted by delegation. For badminton, it is a stage with a dense field of Asian players, even though it does not always carry BWF World Ranking points the way Super 1000 or Super 750 events do. The third round sits immediately before the quarterfinals. In a single-elimination format, meeting a top player at this stage means a campaign can end earlier than planned.

Thuy Linh reached the third round after beating Thalita Ramadhani Wiryawan, then met Chen Yu Fei. Hai Dang reached the third round after beating Abdurakhmanov, then met Kunlavut Vitidsarn. Both stopped at the same round, against the same tier of opponent. That is the notable intersection of the two journeys.

Based on my experience tracking women's badminton in this region, big matches are rarely decided by a single smash. They are decided by the ability to hold the same level of concentration across three games. For a player used to two-game matches on the domestic circuit, the third game at continental level is entirely different terrain. This is the point domestic data can never measure, because domestic opponents do not create the same pressure.

Chen Yu Fei was the world No.4 women's singles player at the time of the match. She belongs to the group that controls match rhythm through steady shuttle placement rather than pure speed. This type of player wins by dragging opponents into long rallies and forcing errors to accumulate point by point. Facing them demands two things: the capacity to endure long rallies, and the ability to finish points at the right moment so as not to drift into passivity.

The 10-21 first game reflected the initial gap. Thuy Linh was pushed into continuous defense, and when a player is not used to that pressure, points fall quickly. There was nothing surprising here; it simply confirmed that a higher-tier opponent will not grant time to settle.

The 24-22 second game is the part worth discussing. To win a game stretched to 24-22 against the world No.4, Thuy Linh had to do two things at once: reduce her own error count and withstand long rallies late in the game. From point 18 onward, every rally was a psychological contest. Holding her composure at level scores and closing it out 24-22 showed a technical and mental base sufficient to match a top-level game.

But the 12-21 third game told the opposite story. The gap here was no longer technical. It was the ability to sustain intensity. After a long game, fitness and focus tend to decline along a curve, and for a player with limited exposure at this level, that curve is steeper. In the deciding game, the gap is not technique but the ability to repeat a peak-level game a third time.

Men's singles told a similar story more clearly. Hai Dang beat Abdurakhmanov 21-6, 21-6. That kind of score shows a player in full control, denying the opponent any chance to build rhythm. It was a standard professional performance against a lower-ranked opponent, and it also showed Hai Dang made no mental errors in the opening round.

Then came Kunlavut Vitidsarn. Kunlavut is known for defensive retrieval and patient counterattacking. He does not attack first; he waits for the opponent to attack, then turns that patience into pressure. For a young player, facing this defensive style often produces errors in the middle of the game, when the attacker begins to feel every smash coming back exactly where it should not.

The 16-21, 14-21 score says that. Hai Dang was not technically overwhelmed, but he found no way through the defensive wall. Each game had a chasing phase, but no explosive phase to create separation. This is the kind of match where, walking in, you need a Plan B if Plan A cannot pick the lock.

Comparing the two Vietnamese players, one common point stands out: both cleared the opening round properly, and both stopped when they met opponents from Asia's top group. The difference lies in how they stopped. Thuy Linh stopped after winning a game against the world No.4. Hai Dang stopped without winning a game. Both showed they can go deep, but not yet that they can stay there.

Worth noting is that the sample here is too small to conclude anything about form. Two matches at one Asian Games cannot draw a trend line. But they are enough to define a specific question, and that question matters more than any general assessment.

The media value of a big game won exceeds its competitive value. That is the part headlines usually omit. A 24-22 game against the world No.4 makes a good story; in this sport's points system, it brings no ranking points. A loss is still a loss. That does not reduce the value of the moment, but it places the moment where it belongs.

There is a blind spot that often appears in how results are read: progress is measured by highlight moments rather than by repeatability. A 24-22 game is treated as proof of progress. Real progress is only proven when a player repeats that level across a run of matches, against different opponents, and holds it in the third game. The court is uneven, but the shuttle still flies and still lands exactly where technique allows.

What stands out at this Asian Games is that both players reached the third round. That is the floor of a badminton nation with depth. But the absence of any medals in team events suggests that depth is still thin. A strong badminton nation does not rest on one men's singles player and one women's singles player. It needs pairs, teams, and a youth pathway that protects technique before reaching for physicality.

Tactics can lose on the board, but losing dignity loses the whole match. In this case, both players left the court with the right posture. That is the foundation to build on.

If that 24-22 game carries value, it lies in defining the area to improve: the third game. The next six months will answer whether Thuy Linh turns that moment into a standard, or whether it remains a fond memory in one writer's notebook. For Hai Dang, the measure is how often he competes on level terms with Asia's top group, not how often he beats lower-ranked opponents. Equality is not the same starting line, but the same stretch of road being lit. That light only counts when it reaches the third game.