※Editor's note = The 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games, which opened on the 19th of last month, will conclude on the afternoon of the 4th after an intense competition on the 16th. Yonhap News is publishing five closing articles covering the overall evaluation, including the performance of the Korean team, the players who shined in the tournament, and the operational difficulties that stood out.
(Nagoya = Yonhap News) Reporter Choi Song-ah = The Korean team maintained 3rd place in the overall ranking at the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games, which aimed to maintain Asia's 'Top 3' and narrow the gap with Japan, but the number of gold medals fell far short of expectations and fell further away from Japan, which had the advantage of being the host country.
As of the 3rd, the day before the closing date of the competition, the Korean team won 39 gold medals, 43 silver medals, and 68 bronze medals, ranking third after China (169 gold, 89 silver, 83 bronze) and Japan (83 gold, 95 silver, 91 bronze).
On the 4th, when the closing ceremony was held, there were only two gold medals remaining in the equestrian competition, so Korea was confirmed to take third place in the competition.
In terms of number of gold medals, it is the worst performance since the 1982 New Delhi Games (28 gold, 28 silver, 37 bronze).
Korea has consistently won over 50 gold medals from the 1986 Seoul Games (93 gold, 55 silver, 76 bronze) to the 2014 Incheon Games (79 gold, 70 silver, 79 bronze). Among these eight competitions, he placed second overall seven times.
However, at the 2018 Jakarta/Palembang Games, the number of gold medals was greatly reduced to 49, and the team was relegated to 3rd place after China and Japan. The number of gold medals decreased until the 2022 Hangzhou Games (42 gold, 59 silver, 89 bronze) held in 2023 and this competition, and '3rd place' seemed to be solidifying.
The Korea Sports Council's original goal for this competition was 40 to 45 gold medals.
The gold medal goals for each sport announced by the Sports Council with 30 days left before the opening were archery, with five goals each, followed by swimming, shooting, fencing, and taekwondo with four each, badminton with three, and modern pentathlon, table tennis, judo, and e-sports with two each.
However, in archery, there were only three gold medals due to disappointment, such as 'no gold' in the recurve women's division for the first time in history, and in swimming, only one gold medal was achieved due to the injury of Kim Woo-min, who won three gold medals in the last competition. There were 3 for shooting and taekwondo, and 2 for badminton.
In fencing, the Korean team achieved the most gold medals in a single event by meeting the target of 4, led by 2-gold winner Oh Sang-wook, but was unable to achieve the overall championship for the 5th time in a row, being pushed out by the host country, Japan, which swept 6 gold medals.
Modern pentathlon also brought home two gold medals as expected, but there was no event in which Korea was overwhelmingly ahead of its top competitors, including being tied for first place with China.
Table tennis performed poorly with ‘no silver’ rather than ‘no gold’, and judo also had only one performance.
In addition, his overall performance fell as he failed to achieve any gold medals in athletics, sepak takraw, wushu, and jiu-jitsu.
In basketball, which broke expectations, three gold veins were burst in the men's and women's 5-on-5 and men's 3-on-3, baseball and men's soccer achieved 5 and 4 consecutive losses, respectively, and women's handball also succeeded in regaining the top spot after 8 years. The fact that they achieved even better results than Hangzhou in team ball games is worthy of being cited as an achievement.
e-Sports completed the 'two gold medals' mission, and the number of gold medals won was 22, similar to the Hangzhou Games (20), including two each in yachting and canoeing, and one in tech ball, which was officially introduced for the first time in this competition.
Japan, which competed at home, won more than 80 gold medals for the first time in the Summer Asian Games, leaving behind its best performance ever, surpassing the 1966 Bangkok Games (78 gold, 53 silver, 33 bronze).
Excluding the 2018 Jakarta-Palembang Games (75 gold, 56 silver, 74 bronze medals), where the country sent first-class teams ahead of the hosting of the Olympics, the number of gold medals has never exceeded 70 in the past 40 years, but in this competition, it swept over 30 more gold medals than the previous Hangzhou Games (52 gold, 67 silver, 69 bronze medals).
Japan was able to widen the gap with Korea by gradually accumulating gold medals in track and field (10), judo (9), cycling (8), swimming and wrestling (7).
In some sports, including fencing, which surpassed Korea for the first time, it is evaluated that the improvement in power with the hosting of the 2020 Tokyo Olympics in 2021 led to the performance.
Although China had fewer gold medals than the 201 at the Hangzhou Games held in its home country, it still took more gold medals than the gold medals of Korea and Japan combined, setting a record of winning the overall championship for the 12th time in a row.
In the management category alone, led by Zhang Zhanshuo, who won seven gold medals for the first time in the Asian Games management category, he took home 17 gold medals in track and field, 16 in shooting, 12 in wushu, and 10 in diving.
Uzbekistan (21 gold medals) and India (19 gold medals) traded 4th and 5th places, but maintained the 'top 5' following the Hangzhou competition.
North Korea, which participated for the first time in the Summer Asian Games held in Japan, dispatched a team of 107 athletes, which was fewer than the previous Hangzhou Games (185), and ranked 12th overall with 7 gold medals, 13 silver medals, and 9 bronze medals.
Compared to the Hangzhou Games, where they won 11 gold medals, some say they performed well considering the reduced number of athletes, and all seven of North Korea's gold medals at this Games came from weightlifting.
