In the year 2023, sprinter Imranur Rahman’s winning gold in the 10th Asian Indoor Athletics championship was the best success in the sports.
Athletes Imanur Rahman won the first ever Gold medal for Bangladesh in the Asian level competitions. He earned the feat in the men’s 60 meter sprint held at Asanta, Kazakhstan on August 21,2023.
Imran also set a new record with taking only 6.59 seconds to finish first.
Bangladesh cricket and football, two most popular games disappointed fans with some dismal performances in 2023.
Men’s Cricket World Cup, where the fans had big expectation, Tigers display very miserable show with winning only two matches out of nine matches they played.
On the other hands, national football teams had better times when they played 15 international matches, won six, drew five and lost four matches. But specially, their performances against the higher ranking teams were very much impressive.
Apart from football and cricket, on other disciplines Bangladesh could do any encouraging results when the federations were successful organising their all national meets regularly.
Among the other sports events, Ha-du-du, popularly known as Kabaddi, National Sport of Bangladesh, earned some significant international success.
Hockey also had some success with Bangladeshi athletes have also some success in individual disciplines in international competitions.
Here are some of Bangladesh's noteworthy international sporting accomplishments.
Kabaddi
Kabaddi is one of the most popular game in Bangladesh. Kabaddi Federation organized the Third Bangbandhu Cup Kabaddi tournament at Shaeed Noor Hossain National Stadium, Paltan, Dhaka on March 13 to 22 in 2023.
Bangladesh emerged as champion in the 12nations tournament defeating Chinese Taipei by 42- 28 points in the final.
A total of 12 teams across several continents (Asia, Europe, Africa and South America) participated in the tournament was organized after the name of the Father of Nation Bangabandhu Sheikh Mujibur Rahman.
Hockey
Hockey, another popular game in Bangladesh, could not do expected result in the Asian Games.
Bangladesh's national men's hockey team won only two matches at Hangzhou in China in Asian games, 2023. They beat lowly Singapore by 7-3 and Uzbekistan by 4-2.
Bangladesh suffered a humiliating 12-0 defeat to India when they also went down to Oman by 4-3 goals and failed to clinch the seventh place.
Handball
Bangladesh U-17 emerged champions in the prestigious Bangabandhu IHF Women’s (youth) Challenge Trophy defeating India by 46-43 goals in the nerve-wracking final at Shaheed Captain M Mansur Ali National Handball Stadium, Dhaka.
However, the Bangladesh U-19 team could not perform like the Under 17 youth team as they lost to India by 48-17 in the final held at the same venue.
Golf
Bangladesh’s premier golfer Siddikur Rahman finished his campaign sharing 15th place in the 19th Asian Games after the final round of the men’s event at the West Lake International Golf Course in Hangzhou, China.
Chess
Chess players participated in different international competitions round the year.
International Master Mohammad Fahad Rahman of Bangladesh finished runner-up to earn the silver medal in the Hanoi Grand Master Chess Tournament'2023 that concluded in Hanoi, Vietnam.
Archery
Archery was also one of the disciplines from which medal was expected from the Asian Games. But Bangladesh archers disappointed much when they finished seventh in the Ranking Round of the Curves Men’s team event of the 19th Asian Archery scoring 1963 at Hangzhou, China.
Sagar Islam finished in 22nd position scoring 662 while Ram Krishna Saha placed 29th scoring 653 to qualify for the individual events.
