Kenya thrashed Hong Kong in Nairobi, 34-10 easing up in the second half or the scoreboard could have looked a lot worse for the visitors such was the home side’s superiority. As their Sevens team has shown on the World Sevens Series with their inaugural win last season Kenyan rugby is vibrant and full of powerful skilled players.
For Hong Kong it was a pretty abject performance full of far too many basic rugby and unforced errors gifting the Kenyans easy ball. That the tour is taking place at all is good news, but the scheduling just before the Asian Sevens Series rather than just after meant that far too many of Hong Kong’s key players weren’t on the pitch. We complain that teams don’t respect us when they send understrength sides to Hong Kong, yet here we are doing the same to Kenya.
“Today’s match was not dissimilar to Tuesday’s loss (28-14 to Kenya A). We looked like a side that haven’t played together and we struggled to put any constructive phases together. They scored 3 or 4 tries purely as a result of us turning the ball over. At this level you get punished for those errors and that was the case,” said coach Leigh Jones making the same excuses as in many of Hong Kong’s recent loses. “It is just getting guys used to playing under this type of pressure. At the moment, the step up is too much for some of them, which forces a large number of errors. But the only answer is to expose them to this level of rugby more often.” Talk about stating the obvious, so why then is this Hong Kong’s first ‘tour’ against non-Asian opposition since 2012? The players can only play against the opponents the HK Rugby Union picks for them.
The test match was effectively over by half time as the visitors conceded two tries and two penalties in the opening forty minutes to hand Kenya an unassailable 20-3 lead at the break. Hong Kong’s only reply came from a late penalty by Matt Rosslee after the centre’s committed chase of fly-half Liam Owen’s booming up-and-under from the Kenyan 22-metre line put the defence under pressure.
Rosslee and Owens marked their international debuts today with four other newly capped players joining the fray from the bench in the second half.
Kenya added two more tries after play resumed to put the game further out of reach. Winger Darwin Mukidzu was a one-man wrecking crew as he paced his side with a perfect six goals from six attempts (two penalties and four conversions), while setting up Kenya’s third try before claiming the fourth.
The scrum was perhaps the only bright spot for the visitors, with Hong Kong’s eight competing well, including in the second half, when hooker Alexander Post, lock Mike Parfitt and flanker Joey Cheung Ho-yin all came on to earn their first caps. The forwards were unable to match that performance in the lineout however, damaging their hopes of playing an old fashioned structured possession game and slowing down their opponents.
Hugo Stiles made it on late in the match as Jones ensured all of Hong Kong’s potential debutants saw the pitch. The new caps accounted for all of Hong Kong’s points when Stiles crossed for his first test try late in the match as Hong Kong took full advantage of a yellow card against Kenya in the 60th minute to camp out on the Kenyan five-metre line. Liam Owens nearly scored in the corner, but showed good awareness and off-loaded the ball to his long-time U20s backline partner Stiles for the try. Rosslee added a nice conversion from the touchline to bring the final score to 34-10 to Kenya.
The result will likely see the two sides swap places in the World Rugby rankings after Hong Kong entered the test ranked 22nd trailed by Kenya at 24.
Watching the match stream it was massively frustrating to see Hong Kong continue to make basic unforced handling errors. The All-Blacks have shown for a decade that ball skills and being comfortable with ball in hand are the way to win modern rugby matches. The vast improvements that teams like Argentina and Kenya have made in recent years is because they have taken this lesson to heart.
So as a fan it’s sad to see that despite being far better funded than both those countries we continue to lose games because of our unforced basic handling errors. Losing because you are outplayed by a better team on the day is one thing, continually losing important games year after year because we gift the opponents the ball is getting really frustrating.
Hong Kong SAR v Kenya:
1. Ben Higgins, 2. Jamie Tsang, 3. Jack Parfitt, 4. Adrian Griffiths, 5. Fin Field, 6. Nick Hewson (Captain), 7. Mathew Lamming, 8. Dan Falvey, 9. Adam Rolston, 10. Liam Owens*, 11. Charles Higson-Smith, 12. Tyler Spitz, 13. Matt Rosslee*, 14. Jamie Robinson, 15. Ed Rolston. Reserves: 16. Alex Post*, 17. Alex Ng Wai-Shing, 18 Adam Fullgrabe, 19. Mike Parfitt*, 20. Tony Wong, 21. Joey Cheung Ho-Yin*, 22. Charles Cheung Ho-Ning, 23. Hugo Stiles*.
*First Hong Kong Cap
Additional reporting and photo: HKRU