Cruise ships, rain & India’s selection storm: How Asian Games 2026 built up

The Asian Games gets underway in Japan’s Aichi-Nagoya on Saturday, with spots for the 2028 Olympic Games in Los Angeles (LA) up for grabs. But the lead-up to one of the world’s biggest multi-sport events—featuring over 17,000 athletes from 45 countries, competing in 71 disciplines across 43 sports—has been dogged by a string of controversies. Here’s a primer on how the 20th edition of the Games have shaped up and what to expect over the next fortnight:

Just 11 days before the start, rainfall wreaked havoc on Nagoya, with 104.5 mm in an hour lashing the city, its highest ever. The downpour caused flooding and around 400 athletes were temporarily evacuated. The athletes returned after the evacuation order was lifted about two days later, and the prelim rounds of the basketball event, which was slated in a few days, went ahead on schedule.

This is the first time in the history of the Asian Games that there will be no Games village. Breaking with the usual practice at multi-sport events, the organisers—seeking to cut costs as well as promote sustainability—have opted for a mixed model of accommodation. Athletes have been put up in temporary shipping-container-style cabins, local hotels and Italian cruise ship Costa Serena docked at Kinjo Pier, which will house around 4,000 people. It is the first time Japan has used such accommodation for a sporting event, prompting questions over the suitability of a cruise ship during the country’s typhoon season.

Complaints about the quality of conventional accommodations, too, have poured in from participating nations, with South Korean officials crying hoarse about them being the “worst ever”, particularly because the beds are too short for basketball players to stretch out. Player Byeon Jun-hyeong posted videos of a leaking sink and wet floors of his room on social media. Officials from the Philippines have moved to Airbnbs, while Indian sports authorities had built replica huts for athletes in Bengaluru for them to acclimatise to the container accommodations.

Aside from the accommodation, the Indian contingent has had enough selection worries to keep itself busy ahead of the Games. Last year, the Sports Authority of India (SAI) had laid down stringent guidelines, allowing only players or teams ranked among the top six in the continent to participate in the tournament. The ministry stuck to its guns while releasing the final list even as some of the excluded players mounted legal challenges.

As a result, both the men’s and women’s soccer squads were withdrawn, so were five tennis players recommended by the All India Tennis Association, a move that drew criticism from the likes of former doubles World No 1 Rohan Bopanna. Those excluded include Sahaja Yamalapalli and Vaishnavi Adkar, the No 1 and 2, respectively, in women’s singles, and 18-year-old Manas Dhamne, who made his first ATP Challenger final this year.

Ankush Agarwalla, who won the 2022 Asian Games gold medal in equestrian, too, failed to qualify and lost his appeal in the Supreme Court as well. Paddler Manika Batra, who made it to the round of 16 in the 2024 Olympic Games, becoming the first India singles player to reach that stage, was also left out of the table tennis squad, falling short of the federation’s domestic participation benchmarks.

Despite the selection hiccups and the absence of medal favourites such as Neeraj Chopra due to injury, India will look to repeat its performance from the 2022 edition, where it made its maiden 100-medal haul. Shooting and archery are expected to lead the charge, while both cricket teams will aim to retain their gold medals.

But, most important, seven sports will offer Olympic quotas for the LA Games, with India set to compete in six—hockey, squash, surfing, sailing, tennis and archery. The Indian athletes in hockey and archery are favourites to secure Olympic berths, with both the men’s and the women’s hockey team finishing as the highest-ranked Asian nation at the recently concluded FIH World Cup.

India has also fielded its strongest players in squash, which will make its Olympic debut in 2028. The sport has been making headlines in the country with teenage prodigy Anahat Singh, who, earlier this year, became the youngest Asian to break into the top 20 in the world. Now ranked 17, Singh remains the highest-ranking Indian in the field, but will have to face stiff competition from two top-10 players in the draw as she bids to earn direct qualification for LA.

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