„Don’t change the winning formula” - the old saying goes. Last year’s World Teqball Championships proved to be the best one to date, so FITEQ decided to organize this year’s competition in Asia, too. For the first time ever, Vietnam will host the largest tournament with high expectations and even higher number of participants as 221 players signed up for the event, setting a new record.

Our WTCH24 preview series came to an end with the men’s doubles, which is going to be an interesting one. Usually, we do not start with who is missing from the field, but this time we have to as the sport’s most decorated duo, Serbia’s Bogdan Marojevic/Nikola Mitro will not compete in Ho Chi Minh City. Their absence created an opening in the top 4 (they made that stage in the past five occasions), so let’s get through the medal contenders.

2023 was all about Csaba Banyik/Balazs Katz (HUN), who suffered only two defeats last year. Fortunately for them, none of those came in Bangkok, as they fought their way to the gold medal, crowning their tremendous campaign. In 2024, they were not as dominant as they were in the previous season, but they still collected two Teqball World Series golds.

Brazilians Matheus Ferraz/Rodrigo Bento Medeiros were incredibly happy with their silver medals in Thailand after two consecutive 4th places, now they are definitely hungry for gold, but they have not competed on the international level since the WTCH2023, so it is hard to judge their shape. Polish stars Adrian Duszak and Marek Pokwap joined forces a couple of months ago, tallying a 5th and a 3rd place at the last two stops of the TWS, respectively, and it is easy to predict that we have not seen them reaching their full potential.

Another twist in the plot is that Jirati Chanliang/Sorrasak Thaosiri outdueled last year’s bronze medallists Boonkoom Tipwong/Phakpong Dejaroen at the Thai qualifiers, and nobody wants to write them off, especially because they won medals at every competition they took part at in 2024.

Want some potential upsetters? We got you. Without Apor Gyorgydeak, Romania still fields a strong duo with Hunor Kristaly/Arnold Szilagyi, then there is one of the youngest athletes at the WTCH24 Alexander Hamm with Daniel Neuhold (Austria), Jose Ricardo Oviedo Amortegui/Joshua Bello (Colombia), Lukas Flaks/Matej Kubovy (Czechia), Mathias Landen Jeppesen/Brian Mengel Thomsen (Denmark), Ali Jalil Mezher Alelayawi/Abdulrahman Ahmed Radhi (Iraq), Nicola Carlini/Arovetto Lombardi (Italy), Basel Ahmad Hasan/Abdulwahab Alquattan (Kuwait), Marko Zarkovic/Andrija Jovanovic (Montenegro), Luis Santos/Joao Pinheiro (Portugal), Yassine and Youssef Sahli (Tunisia), or Dmytro Shevchuk/Oleh Usychenko (Ukraine), while the host country will be represented by Giang Ba Truong/Xuan Thanh Cao.

The World Teqball Championships 2024 starts on 4th December, the games will be played at Nguyen Hue Pedestrian Plaza in Ho Chi Minh City.