A look back at the SEA Games performance

Exceeding the goal for the number of gold medals represents a major success for Vietnam at the SEA Games 25 – but how did the games perform overall?

Thanh Tra won a gold medal for springboard at the SEA Games 2009.

And do Vietnam’s achievement really live up to the hype when compared to international criteria?

At the 3^rd Asian Games in Japan in 1958, Vice Chairman of the Thai Olympic Committee Laung Sukhumnaipradit proposed to organize a major sports games for Southeast Asian countries. The idea was warmly supported by all Southeast Asian sports delegations because they saw that this region was still underperforming in sports and needed to have its own opportunities to raise its ability.

The number of state members of the Association of Southeast Asian Nations (ASEAN) has increased from six to eleven but the guidelines for the SEA Games has not changed: The SEA Games is a sport festival for Southeast Asia aimed at building friendship and improving the region’s sporting ability in order to match international performances.

But it’s that second goal where some are claiming the SEA Games are falling short.  Can they help bridge the gap to Olympic standard when so many of the events are not even on the Olympics’ schedule?

In the next Olympics there will be no wushu, muay, pencak silat, shuttle cock, pencak takraw, billiards, snooker and pentanque.

Meanwhile, important Olympic events including apparatus exercise, basketball, handball, and boat racing were not in the SEA Games 2009. The Southeast Asian Sports Federation not only adds or rejects sports as it chooses, it also sets the number of medals for each sports.

For example, the Beijing Olympics had 15 sets of medals for shooting while the SEA Games 25 have 34 sets.  Taekwondo at the Olympics has 8 sets of medals and up to 21 at Sea Games.  Judo had 14 at the Olympic and 18 at the SEA Games.  And the 21 sets of medals for wushu is more than the whole Chinese Wushu Championship.

The federation obeys no rules in fixing the number of sports and the number of medal sets for Sea Games.  It’s seen as serving the achievements of the host country of the SEA Games or a group of participating countries.

This phenomenon has been the case for several SEA Games. At the SEA Games 2003, the host Vietnam ranked first in the medal tally. Its number of gold medals doubled that of Thailand, the second team.

When Philippines hosted the games, it ranked second while it was only mid table the previous games. This year, host country Laos obtained 33 gold medals for the first time.

It will continue at the next SEA Games when hosts Indonesia, are likely to reject sports Laos favored at this year’s event. These include pentanque, muay, shuttle cock and wushu. They are likely to be replaced by roller-skating, kempo, wall climbing and power lifting.

Why aren’t the traditional sports of host countries limited while Olympic sports made more prevalent?

Can Vietnam count itself as successful?

When China topped Olympic 2008 medals tables, international sports reporters asked themselves if China was the top sporting country in the world.

For most, the answer was “no”, based on the two major criteria of the International Olympic Committee used to evaluate a country’s sporting achievements.  The first criteria are performance in the sports of athletics and swimming and the second were in the more widely popular sports like football, volleyball, tennis and basketball.

Using these criteria we take a look at Vietnam’s performance at SEA Games 25:

Vietnam, Indonesia and the Philippines won seven gold medals in track and field each - compared to 14 gold medals by Thailand. Vietnam’s seven gold medals were taken by four familiar faces – Vu Thi Huong, Truong Thanh Hang, Nguyen Dinh Cuong and Vu Van Huyen.

Several years ago, Vietnam was very strong in high-jump with Bui Thi Nhung and Nguyen Duy Bang but Bang retired while Nhung performed poorly at SEA Games 2009. Vietnam’s track-and-field, therefore, is at a standstill.

Among 32 sets of medals for swimming, Vietnam earned only one gold medal, behind Singapore (14), Malaysia (9), the Philippines (4), Thailand and Indonesia (2).

In the “sports for the masses”, Vietnam won only one gold medal for women’s football. Women’s volleyball didn’t improve while men’s volleyball fell to fourth place. Vietnam had no success in tennis and badminton.

With that record, can the games really be called a “brilliant success” as sports officials stated?

It is time for Vietnam to restructure and set a new direction for future development: focusing on sports in the Olympic schedules to achieve sustainable development.

VietNamNet/Tuoi Tre