Asian Games 2026: India’s campaign begins with teqball as Gonsalves-Beg eye medal

Nagoya: India's campaign at the 2026 Asian Games will get underway with teqball on Thursday, two days before the official opening ceremony in Aichi-Nagoya, Japan.

The men's doubles pairing of Declan Marshall Gonsalves and Mohamed Anas Imran Beg will be India's first athletes in action at the continental Games, as per Olympics.com.

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Invented in Hungary, teqball combines elements of football with a curved table. The sport can broadly be described as a blend of freestyle football and sepak takraw, played on a curved, table tennis-style surface.

Gonsalves and Beg are already World Championships medallists, having secured India's first-ever medal in teqball with a men's doubles bronze at the 2024 edition in Vietnam.

Drawn in Group B of the men's doubles competition, the pair will play two matches on Thursday at the Nagoya City Higashi Sports Centre.

The Indian pair will open against Vietnam's Truong Giang Ba and Anh Khoa Le at 12:30 PM IST before taking on the Republic of Korea's Junsuk Lee and Taebeen Lee at 1:00 PM IST.

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The quarter-finals are scheduled for later in the day, with the Indian pair needing to navigate the group stage to secure a place in the knockout rounds. A repechage route also offers a second chance to advance.

Teqball will make its Asian Games debut at Aichi-Nagoya 2026, with five medal events, men's and women's singles, men's and women's doubles, and mixed doubles, set to be contested from September 17 to 20.