Member countries have raised many question on the events that will be played in next year’s Vietnam Sea Games.
Host Vietnam accepted appeals from numerous sports officials during an online SEA Games Federation meeting last Wednesday and will soon decide on a finalized list of sports events.
Vietnam will make the Games calendar known by November this year at the earliest.
In a meeting that was attended by Philippine Olympic Committee president Abraham Tolentino and secretary general Ed Gastanes, Vietnam officials informed the attendees that that they need time to consider the 22 sports that are under appeal from member countries for inclusion.
There were appeals for 11 sports: indoor hockey, tenpin bowling, sailing cricket, skateboarding, sambo, floorball, netball, lawn bowls, squash and rugby sevens.
Aside from these, the inclusion of muay thai, triathlon, taekwondo, traditional boat race, jiujitsu, esports, arnis, obstacle course sports, kempo, teqball and soft tennis were also put forward.
Host Vietnam has also appealed for three sports: chinlone (sepak takraw), water polo and synchronized swimming.
So far, the number has been reduced from 56 events last year to 36 events next year.
Tolentino, who is also the representative of the eighth district of Cavite in Congress, said there are already 36 sports with 450 events, and organizers may accept four more sports disciplines, with one demonstration event.
“It’s for them to decide with eight countries asking more than 20 more sports,” said Tolentino at the end of the virtual conference.
Among the events that have been listed so far includes the two compulsory sports of athletics and aquatics, which has swimming and diving events.
There’s archery, badminton, basketball 5-on-5 and 3X3, boxing, billiards and snooker, canoe-kayak, chess, Xiangqui, cycling road and mountain bike.
Other sports mentioned were dancesport, fencing, football, futsal, golf, gymnastics’ artistic, rhythmic and aerobics, handball indoor and beach, judo, karate, muay, pencak silat and pétanque.
Also listed are rowing, sepak takraw, shooting’s pistol, rifle and shotgun, table tennis, taekwondo, tennis, indoor volleyball, beach volleyball, weightlifting and wrestling greco roman and freestyle.
The events of finswimming, bodybuilding, wushu, kurash, kickboxing and Vietnam’s traditional sports vovinam were the other sports in the list.