One of the joys of Rugby Week is that it embraces and unites HongKongers without fear or favour of who you are, where you work or what colour your skin is.
A packed King’s Park saw players from across the globe and of every age play rugby, enjoy life, make new friends and enjoy an excellent bacon butty!
At the Kowloon Rugby Fest, there were winners, but no losers!
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Tickets for the Hong Kong Sevens go on sale today from 10am. The tournament, 5-7 April 2024, will be the 30th and last at the Hong Kong Stadium before the event moves to the new Kai Tak Sports Park in 2025.
Hong Kong Sevens
Date: 5-7 April, 2024
Venue: HK Stadium
Tickets: $1,950
More info: www.HKsevens.com
After four amazing quarter-finals last weekend, the Rugby World Cup continued today with the first of the semi-finals at the Stade de France.
While it would have been too much to hope for that the semi might approach the heights of skill and attacking rugby of the quarters! The New Zealand All Blacks barely had to get out of second gear to trash Argentina – whose performances have been perhaps the biggest disappointment of the tournament.
Having started slowly, the All Blacks appear to be hitting top form as the final approaches. Who will they face, South Africa or England?
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All images copyright © of simon durrant / bc magazine
The Rugby World Cup continued at the Stadium de Toulouse today as Japan faced up to the Samoan Siva Tau and a fierce Samoan flurry in the last quarter to clinch a hard-fought victory.
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All images copyright © of simon durrant / bc magazine
The Rugby World Cup 2023 kicked off tonight with hosts France beating New Zealand 27-13. At the Place de la Concorde fans from across the globe gathered to watch the game at the Rugby Village.
The action started a little earlier than planned with French police discovering and then blowing up a suspect package close to the rugby village. Which had expanded across the roads to accommodate the expected 40,000 fans.
As kick-off approached a noisy and expectant throng proudly sang their national anthems only to fall almost deathly quiet as New Zealand scored a quick opening try…
Test your power on the scrum machine.
Fans proudly sing La Marseillaise
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The Rugby World Cup 2023 begins in Paris today, but you’d be hard pressed to know it. The tournament appears invisible in a city preparing for the 2024 Olympics.
Walking down the iconic Champs-Élysées – which has a fair incline that is not apparent when watching the Tour de France cyclists race along it at 50mph – the Rugby World Cup doesn’t appear to exist. bc approached several people and asked if they knew the World Cup was starting today, sadly none did.
Why are the banners on the Champs-Élysées lampposts promoting Paris’s IT week not the World Cup?
The only obvious indication of the tournament’s presence in the city is the doubling of hotel and hostel prices and bars and restaurants increasing their prices for game day.
There is a Rugby Village at the Place de la Concorde but it doesn’t open until this afternoon (and only on select days afterwards) so there really is nowhere for visiting or local or new fans to gather and meet up.
A big part of rugby is the social camaraderie between fans, yet the tournament organisers seem to have done nothing to build awareness and interest in the game among new fans . It feels like a missed opportunity, especially as the recent women’s football World Cup showed how a country can be transformed by a tournament.
The Hong Kong Rugby Union announced the men’s XV to face South Korea in the finale of the 2023 Asia Rugby Championship at Hong Kong Football Club (kick off at 17.00). It is a largely settled squad with only two changes to the starting line-up that hammered Malaysia in last week’s opener 88-9.
“Consistency is key. Last week, players from 1 to 15 all performed, and there were some real selection headaches this week as we expected. Certain guys really stood up against Malaysia but there are also other guys we wanted to see more of as well,” said Hong Kong China coach Lewis Evans.
With both Hong Kong and South Korea returning heavy wins over Malaysia, the preamble to Saturday’s fixture has left little for observers to rely on when judging form.
“Expect the unexpected is what we told the team,” added Evans. “We are coming in confident, and have things in place to combat what South Korea can offer, but ultimately it comes down to us backing up our performance and getting consistency in our game.”
That desire for consistency has left the starting XV largely unchanged from that against Malaysia. Captain Tom Hill retains his spot at inside centre while his vice-captain and club teammate Patrick Jenkinson reclaims his second-row starting spot from Malaysia.
Prop forward Ash Hyde has dropped out of the matchday 23 after struggling with illness in the conditions against Malaysia, with veteran Ben Higgins earning the start on his 25th appearance. It is the only change in the starting pack with Higgins joined by Alex Post (who scored a natural brace versus Malaysia) and Fai Solomona in the front row. Jenkinson will again partner with sevens squad member Callum McCullough in the locks, with an unchanged back row of Luke van der Smit at No.8 and Sam Tsoi Kin-san and James Sawyer on the flanks.
In the backline, fullback Paul Altier is forced to make way for utility back Nate DeThierry after picking up a red card in the game versus Malaysia.
“Paul was really good under the high ball against Malaysia and we expect to see a lot of that from South Korea. Nate is a very confident player and is comfortable at 15 having played there for us during the repechage,” said Evans.
DeThierry started in the centres last week. His vacated outside centre spot will be occupied by Harry Sayers who started last week’s tie on the bench. Jamie Lauder and Gregor McNeish resume their half-back pairing with Seb Brien and Charles Higson-Smith retaining their spots on the wings after combining for six tries against Malaysia.
Despite the successful performance against Malaysia, Evans has opted to give opportunities to more new players in the reserves. With a strong forwards battle expected against South Korea, the bench has a 5-3 forwards to backs split with two potential first caps waiting in the wings in front rower Matt Keay and back Dylan White.
White moves into the matchday 23 with a chance at collecting his first Hong Kong China cap and provides added depth at fly-half and fullback, while Bryn Phillips and Will Panday also retain their places in the 23-man squad for the South Korea test.
“With the likes of Dylan and some of the other players we are starting a slow transition into that environment. Come November, players like that will need bigger opportunities and we want to start getting them involved now in the international environment, so that when they get the call up to start which probably comes in the next 12 or 18 months, they will be ready,” Evans added.
Keay, Keelan Chapman and Zac Cinnamond add to a deep supply of front rowers while former Hong Kong captain Josh Hrstich is also returning to international action after suffering a calf strain in May. He will start off the bench providing back-row support alongside Pierce Mackinlay-West, who scored one of Hong Kong’s 13 tries last week after coming on in the second half.
“Josh is back in form and having him back in training has had a huge impact on the squad. He has completed his fitness tests and is confident and capable to play international rugby this week. Our back row combination played really well and made this a difficult selection, but with strong players like Josh and Pierce coming off the bench we can maintain that intensity and physicality we are after in the second half against Korea,” noted Evans.
“The coaches were really proud of the way the boys conducted themselves versus Malaysia. South Korea are a different beast and we know that. We need to manage them in the set piece and at the contact area and they have a very strong kicking game that we will need to deal with as well. But we are entering this game with confidence and have had a really good week of training. The boys look sharp. They are ready,” said Evans.
Can’t stand the rain? Watch the live stream on HKRU TV.
Hong Kong, China squad versus South Korea, HKFC 17.00 17 June 2023:
Hong Kong v South Korea
Asia Rugby Championship 2023
Date: 5pm, 17 June, 2023
Venue: Hong Kong Football Club
Tickets: tbc
Additional reporting, images: Asia Rugby, HKrugby
Hong Kong men’s XV marked its first home match since June 2019 with an emphatic 88-9 win over Malaysia in the Asia Men’s Rugby Championship at a packed-out Hong Kong Football Club.
Seb Brien paced all scorers with five tries while Hong Kong scored 13 tries in total to push a 45-6 lead at the break into the final 79-point margin in front of over 1,200 fans.
“We are delighted to mark the return of men’s international rugby to Hong Kong for the first time since June 2019,” said Chris Brooke, Chairman of the Hong Kong Rugby Union after the match.
“This is another milestone in Hong Kong rugby’s recovery from the pandemic. Today was a great celebration and the support from the rugby community throughout what has been a challenging period has been incredible. The team has picked up right where it left off and I am sure that next week will be an electric finale for the Asia Rugby Championship,” added Brooke.
Hong Kong’s first men’s home test in four years brought out a reaction in the squad as they jumped out to a 3-0 lead after 90 seconds through a penalty from fly-half Gregor McNeish, currently playing for VPC Andorra. That lead soon ballooned to 31 points by the half-hour marker as scrumhalf Jamie Lauder, Brien and No.8 Luke van der Smith added first quarter tries before Malaysia fly-half Fairuz Ab Rahman notched his side’s first points with a penalty after 17 minutes to make the score 24-3.
Poor kicking from hand and general indecision plagued Malaysia throughout as they continued to serve up possession for Hong Kong. The visitors could only muster one further foray in to the Hong Kong half in the early going when fullback Paul Altier, currently playing for Stade Olympique Chamberien in France, was sin-binned for an intentional knock-on, foiling a dangerous intercept attack from Malaysia.
Hong Kong would score two short-handed tries despite their opponents’ numerical advantage with McNeish crossing the whitewash followed by lock Callum McCullough, who alongside Seb Brien and Pierce Mackinlay-West was one of three sevens athletes to score today. McNeish’s fifth conversion brought the score to 38-6 before a relieved Altier exited the bin.
A moment of panic by the Malaysian winger with the ball in his own dead ball area set the stage for Hong Kong’s sixth score as a great rush defence produced ball for Brien’s second score and gave Hong Kong, China a 45-6 advantage at the break.
Malaysia’s hopes of stabilizing were dashed at the restart when van der Smit nearly ran the ball back for another rapid-fire score from the kick-off. He was clawed down at the line but Brien popped up with ball in hand shortly thereafter to complete his hat trick as Hong Kong passed 52-6.
Richmond hooker Alex Post then scored back-to-back tries at the base of Hong Kong’s driving maul, capping a highly efficient day for the forwards who also stole two lineouts from Malaysia this afternoon.
Post’s second try brought the score to 62-6 after McNeish missed his first conversions of the day, going eight for eight from the tee until that moment. Coach Lewis Evans then emptied his bench down the final stretch with forward Tang Man-chung earning his first senior cap for Hong Kong, China.
In the final quarter, Altier was shown a red card for a poor challenge in the ruck leaving his side a man down for the remainder. Hong Kong didn’t look any worse for wear as they added a third short-handed try from close to the line with another sevens athlete, Pierce Mackinlay-West, scoring to push the lead to 67-6.
Brien then collected back-to-back tries to run his personal tally to five and bring the lead to 81-6 before Malaysia’s Nazvi Fitri slotted a penalty to bring the score to 81-9. Reserve scrumhalf Bryn Phillips added an exclamation point to Hong Kong’s big win with Hong Kong’s 13th try of the game at the hooter pushing the final score to 88-9 after a conversion from Nate DeThierry.
“That was so much fun,” said a delighted Brien post-match. “It’s really nice to get back to fifteens rugby in Hong Kong and it was an awesome team performance today, which was exactly what we wanted. Sometimes games like that can get off script, but we just kept building that momentum for next week. We have quite a new squad so to have a performance like that ahead of next week is huge,” he added.
It was also an excellent debut as captain for centre Tom Hill in only his fifth appearance for Hong Kong: “That was a really pleasing performance,” said Hill.
“It is awesome to be playing rugby again in Hong Kong in front of our home crowd and it is a huge honour to captain this team. We’re just looking forward to next week now. The Asia Rugby Championship is really important. We have won it the last few years and we want to keep winning it and go on to the next level,” added Hill.
Today also marked the debut home test for coach Lewis Evans who was equally complimentary about his side’s performance saying: “It was a very comprehensive performance. We were focused on that more than the win and the boys delivered.
“We knew Malaysia would come out with intent and energy and I think we controlled that and took our chances well. So very positive and very pleased with that result. There will be a lot of headaches for selection against South Korea coming our way,” he added.
Additional reporting and images: HKRU
