Bangladesh women's football team are set to participate at the Asian Games for the first time ever, but the men's side will miss out on the prestigious event due to their performance in recent times.
An executive committee meeting of Bangladesh Olympic Association was held in the capital Saturday where it was decided to send 17 sports disciplines to the 19th edition of the Asiad, scheduled to be held in China later this year.
“The expenditure will be more if we send both teams. The recent performance of the men's football team is not satisfactory while the women's team are South Asian champions. So we decided to send the women's team only,” Bangladesh's chef de mission and BOA treasurer A K Sarkar told Dhaka Tribune.
Bangladesh have never taken part in the women's football event of the Asian Games before, a source from the BOA confirmed to Dhaka Tribune.
National women's team head coach Golam Rabbani Choton was delighted to hear that his charges would be performing in the biggest multi-sports competition of the continent.
“I can't remember if we ever participated at the Asiad before. It will be a huge experience for the girls. It will increase competitiveness among the team,” said Choton, who has been national women's team coach since 2009.
The exclusion of the men's football team however, raised eyebrows as they made history during the last edition in Indonesia five years ago by qualifying for the knockout stages for the first time.
Sarkar though did not deny the possibility of including the men's football team in the upcoming meetings.
Meanwhile, other sports disciplines are archery, athletics, cricket, fencing, gymnastics, hockey, golf, kabaddi, karate, swimming, shooting, chess, weightlifting, bridge, taekwondo and boxing.
The 19th Asian Games was earlier scheduled to be held last year but Covid pandemic forced the mega event to be postponed.
The Games is rescheduled to take place from September 23 to October 8 this year in Hangzhou featuring a total of 482 events from 40 sports.
