"After the game, we were washing our uniforms until 4 a.m."
Taiwan's national baseball team at the 2026 Aichi-Nagoya Asian Games found itself struggling not with opponents but with laundry. After finishing an evening game and facing another at noon the next day, players had to wash their own uniforms because they could not use the laundry service in time.
Game Against Korea Ended at 9 p.m. Players Scrubbed Uniforms Until 4 a.m.
According to Taiwanese outlet Mirror Daily and other media on the 23rd, players on Taiwan's national baseball team returned to their lodgings after their first group-stage game against South Korea on the 21st and washed their uniforms by hand into the early hours.
Taiwan lost 5-0 to South Korea in a game that began at 6:30 p.m. at Okazaki Civic Stadium. The game ended around 9 p.m., but the players' day was not over. They had to wash the uniforms they would need to wear again for the following day's game against Thailand.
Taiwan's captain, Chen Min-szu, told local media that the team had to do its own laundry after arriving at the hotel late. "By the time we finished, it was 3 or 4 a.m., and we had to get up again around 6 or 7 a.m.," he said. "We basically got almost no sleep."
A laundry service was not entirely absent. The organizing committee ran a service for the delegations, but returning items took more than 24 hours and in some cases nearly two days. That made it impractical to hand over uniforms needed the very next day.
Players ended up searching for washing machines themselves. But other delegations were in the same situation, so machines were in demand and waits grew long.
Taiwan then had to face Thailand at noon on the 22nd at Toyohashi Civic Stadium, about 15 hours after the game against South Korea. "The schedule at this tournament seems to be a bit much for the players," Chen said. "We were really exhausted."
Despite the lack of sleep, Taiwan beat Thailand 15-0. The team played its final preliminary game against Hong Kong on the 23rd and advanced to the super round with a 2-1 record in Group B.
Told 'Pants Only' Before Hiring an Outside Laundry Firm
Confusion over laundry began before the tournament started. According to former Taiwanese professional baseball player Pan Chang-yung, the organizing committee informed delegations ahead of the event of a rule to the effect that only pants could be washed, citing concerns that uniforms could be damaged.
As the inconvenience continued, the Chinese Taipei Baseball Association sought out and signed a contract with a local professional laundry company. Handing uniform and equipment cleaning to an outside firm brought the "laundry war" to a close.
Laundry was not the only operational complaint at the tournament. Some delegations raised problems with lodging and meals, and buses carrying athletes headed to the wrong stadiums or failed to show up at all, disrupting game and training schedules.
Japanese outlet The Digest said of the tournament that complaints were emerging that the problems were so serious it was hard to believe Japan was the host, pointing to what it described as a failure of the overall operating system rather than isolated mistakes.
Takaaki Omi, deputy secretary-general of the organizing committee's secretariat, apologized at a news conference on the 22nd for human errors in the tournament's operation. He acknowledged that the bus no-show experienced by the South Korean delegation and a problem with the playing of North Korea's national anthem were "clear mistakes," and said the committee was drawing up improvement measures every day.
