Vu Thi Nguyet Anh showed good performance on Tuesday by beating Malaysia’s Anthony Vasantha Marial in the final of the women’s kumite of the karate competition at the Asian Games in Doha, Qatar.
With Anh’s gold medal that day, the Vietnamese contingent climbed to the 18th position in the medal tally with two golds, nine silvers and seven bronzes.
Anh defeated Marial 6-1 in the final after beating Tiemsurakan Jittikan of Thailand 4-0 in a semifinal and the Philippines’ Sorjano Mea 2-1 in a quarterfinal in the under 48-kilogram category.
The Vietnamese is 22 years old now. Last year, she won the Southeast Asian Games gold medal for the first time, also in this category.
Earlier on Tuesday in Doha, Viet Nam’s 2006 world runner-up Nguyen Hoang Ngan earned just a silver in the women’s kata category. She lost 0-5 to Japan’s Morooka Nao in the final after defeating Macau’s Ceung Puisi 4-1, both Hong Kong’s Yip Cheng Yee and Sijakhwa Sulochana of Nepal at 5-0, respectively in the round of 16, quarterfinal and semifinal.
Also on Tuesday, her teammate Pham Tran Nguyen lost 3-4 to Ramasamy Puvaneswaran of Malaysia in the quarterfinal of the men’s kumite 55 kg category. He then beat Jaji Johari of Brunei 7-1, qualifying for the bronze playoff, in which the Vietnamese absolutely won 8-0 over Maulidin Bambang of Indonesia, securing the bronze.
In the men’s 60 kg category, Nguyen Ngoc Thanh competed against Dalloul Abdullah of the host country Qatar in the bronze playoff. The Vietnamese lost 2-6.
In sepaktakraw, Viet Nam knocked out archrivals Thailand 2-1 in the women’s double preliminary round on Tuesday. The Thais won 21-17 in the first set. The Vietnamese women bounced to a 21-16 victory in the second set, then beat 15-13 in the final, qualifying for the semifinals.
In the women’s volleyball event, Viet Nam defeated Mongolia 3-0 to rank seventh in all.
