New Delhi: The Indian men’s and women’s kabaddi teams moved a step closer to retaining their gold medals after securing convincing wins in their respective semifinals on Friday, September 25. Both sides booked their spots in the gold-medal matches, keeping their bid for consecutive titles firmly on track.
The women’s team advanced to the summit clash with a 48-24 victory over Nepal, while the men’s side joined them after defeating Thailand 66-28 in the last-four stage of the Asian Games 2026. The dominating victories also kept the two defending champion sides’ unbeaten campaign in the ongoing edition intact.
In the women’s match, India took a sizeable 31-17 lead in the first half, including four all-out and four bonus points. Nepal failed to challenge India throughout the match and only managed to gather to score seven points in the second half. The men’s clash followed a similar script as they went up 37-18 in the first half and maintained the advantage in the second half.
The huge gap in experience and quality was quite clear as India collected 15 bonus points, compared to Thailand’s five. Both teams will face the winner of the Iran-Chinese Taipei semi-final in their respective finals.
Women’s kabaddi became an Asian Games sport for the first time in 2010, and the Indian team have dominated in every edition so far. India are also the defending champions in the men’s event as well. Men’s kabaddi has been a part of the Asian Games roster since 1990, with India claiming eight gold medals so far.
The only other country to have won gold apart from India in the competition is Iran, which finished on top in 2018. India had settled for a bronze in that edition.
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This is India’s second gold medal at the 2026 Asian Games. Earlier, the Indian women’s cricket team won the country’s first gold medal after defeating Sri Lanka in the final.