bc magazine

Asia Rugby Women’s Sevens Series – China Sevens

Hong Kong’s women 7s team convincingly won all three of its pool games at the Asia Rugby Women’s Sevens Series – China Sevens being held in Qingdao over the weekend of the 5-6 September, 2015.

Aggie Poon scored 7 tries in the opening two games against Singapore and Sri Lanka as Hong Kong ran out convincing winners in both games.

In the final game of the day against pool top seed China, Hong Kong triumphed 19-12 in a hard fought game.

Stephanie Cuvelier picked up a brace of tries as returned to the Hong Kong team after a 2 year injury break

Saturday Pool Results

Hong Kong 53 – 0 Singapore
Hong Kong
Try: Aggie Pak Yan Poon (4), Stephanie Cuvelier (2), Amelie Odile Marie Seure, Ka Yan Chong, Natasha Olson-Thorne
Conversion: Aggie Poon (2), Colleen Tjosvold, Amelie Odile Marie Seure

Hong Kong 27 – 5 Sri Lanka
Hong Kong
Try: Aggie Pak Yan Poon (3), Natasha Olson-Thorne, Wai Sum Sham
Conversion: Aggie Pak Yan Poon
Sri Lanka
Try: Madduma Muthugalage Ayesha Sewwandi Perera

Hong Kong 19 – 12 China
Try: Natasha Olson-Thorne, Colleen Tjosvold, Tsz Ting Cheng
Conversion: Aggie Pak Yan Poon (2)

Images courtesy HKRFU

Olympic Sevens Qualifying

The Hong Kong Sevens are the best global sporting social event around, in a world before the Internet and instant global communication the HK Sevens were known across the globe even by non-rugby players like myself. For my first tickets I queued overnight in a freezing Victoria Park and stayed three months in a city I’d planned to visit for a few days. That three months, turned into a lifetime and I’m now proudly a Hongkong and this wonderful city is my home. That first Sevens an ecstatic happy memory, the 21 that have followed, some of the best days of each year even though it’s hard work.

I love the Sevens and appreciate that they’re HK Rugby Football Union’s golden goose the multi-million annual tournament that stuffs the Union’s bank account to over-flowing. The competition that even now in the era of professional rugby, players dream of attending or playing at above almost any other. That ‘other’ was once perhaps singular, the Rugby World Cup, from 2016 the ‘other’ is a duo as the Olympics embraces Rugby 7s for the first time.

It’d be tough to say which is the biggest and best known sporting tournament in the world, the Olympics or the Football World Cup. The Olympics probably just shade it. The roar at the HK Stadium when Hong Kong won the shield in 2010 for their first trophy in a decade was amazing. But Lee Lai Shan wining gold at the Olympics was monumental as was Li Ching and Ko Lai Chak’s silver in 2004. Watching Sarah Lee win a bronze medal live at the London Olympics 2012 had me screaming at the computer monitor and walking around so proud and happy of a HongKonger’s achievement on the biggest of biggest sporting stages.

The Olympics, for all their faults, are when the world focuses on sport almost exclusively for a couple of weeks. Hong Kong’s men’s and women’s rugby 7s teams, both have a chance to be among the twelve countries who qualify to compete at Rio2016. The Olympics only happen every four years so qualifying is a hard and rare opportunity, and the fame of the HKSevens has given Hong Kong home advantage for both tournaments.

Really, you didn’t know – I’m not surprised. Tickets for the November 7-8 Qualification Tournament went on sale last week. Yet there’s no mention of this on the website of the HKRFU. Nothing on it’s facebook page, not even a tweet (account suspended). There’s been no press release about tickets going onsale. No details of how many tickets are available locally to the general public (are the Union worried that having 38,000 tickets for sale will reveal how much they are screwing the public allocation at the 7s – come on the public are not stupid, they know they get screwed every March on tickets). Nothing, nada! A black hole of promotion, advertising and awareness.

It is quite frankly a disgrace, Hong Kong might not win the gold medal at Rio2016 but qualifying would be a fantastic achievement. The roar of packed HK Stadium might be the eighth man that pushes Hong Kong across the qualification try-line against our two toughest regional rivals Japan and China. So why does the HKRFU ignore this wonderful opportunity? Are they incompetent? Jealous that the Olympics will injure their annual golden goose? Or is Olympic rugby, like women’s rugby a part of the game to be suffered by the male dinosaurs who run the local game because they’re not feted and fawned upon, their ego’s stroked, as they are by all those $uper rich corporate$ desperate for access to the holy grail of sevens tickets!

Sort it out! The players and fans deserve better!

HKRFU website 18 August, 2015 - 4 days after tickets went onsale. — HKRFU website 18 August, 2015 – 4 days after tickets went onsale.

Olympic Sevens Qualifier Tickets Onsale 14 August

An anonymous source has informed bc that tickets for the Women’s and Men’s Olympic Rugby 7s Qualifier tournament on the 7-8 November at the HK Stadium will go onsale on the 14th August from Ticketflap (www.ticketflap.com).

That 24 hours before the tickets are scheduled to go onsale there’s been no announcement to public is another example of the Union unable to organise a piss-up in a brewery. This despite rugby’s renowned enjoyment of the personal waitress service and beverages that many Wanchai and Angeles’s breweries offer.

While tickets prices were released weeks ago, $360 (2-day pass), $200 (1-day pass), there’s been no information from the HKRFU or Asia Rugby about the number of tickets for public sale. There should though, be more than the 3000/day HK Sevens tickets that the public were allowed to maul over in March.

The women’s qualifier is an 8 team event, the first part of a two leg qualification process that culminates in Tokyo on 28-29 November 2015. Teams competing in the women’s event are China, Hong Kong, Japan, Kazakhstan, Singapore, Sri Lanka, Thailand and Uzbekistan.

Teams competing in the men’s event are Hong Kong, Chinese Taipei, Iran, Japan, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, Sri Lanka, South Korea, Thailand and China

Asia Rugby Sevens Olympic Qualifier
Date: 7-8 November, 2015
Venue: HK Stadium
Tickets: $360 (2-day pass), $200 (1-day pass), under 12 free from Ticketflap
More info: Public sale from 14 August

Asia Rugby 7s Qualifier – Tickets

Tickets for the Asia Rugby 7s Qualifier on 7/8 November in the Hong Kong Stadium will go on sale next week through Ticketflap. This tournament will determine which Asian men’s and women’s teams will be playing in the first ever Olympic Rugby Sevens in Rio next year – it doesn’t get any bigger than that!!!

Exact details, date, time etc when we have them

Tickets for the two day Asia Olympic Sevens Qualifier are priced at $360 for a 2 day pass and $200 for a day pass. The two day tournament will feature the men’s and women’s Rio2016 Asia qualification matches.

The men’s tournament is a 12 team event featuring with the men’s winner claiming Asia’s sole automatic slot amongst the 12 teams participating in the 2016 Summer Olympics in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil, where Rugby Sevens will make its much anticipated debut. Competing to be Asia’s representative will be China, Chinese Taipei, Hong Kong, Iran, Japan, Kazakhstan, Malaysia, Philippines, Singapore, South Korea, Sri Lanka, Thailand

Already qualified for the men’s competition are Fiji, New Zealand, South Africa, Great Britain, USA, Argentina and the hosts Brazil. The remaining five places will be awarded to the winners of regional qualifiers in Europe, Oceania, Africa and the Hong Kong tournament for Asia as well as the winner of a 16-team international repêchage tournament to be held later in the year.

The winner heading to Rio to join New Zealand, Canada, Australia, Great Britain, Colombia, USA, France and hosts Brazil who have already booked their spots at the 2016 Olympic Games

“The opportunity to participate in an Olympic Games is the ultimate dream for any athlete, and we are totally focused on preparing for the November tournaments,” commented women’s sevens veteran Cheng Ka Chi.

Asia Rugby Sevens Qualifier
Date: 7-8 November, 2015
Venue: HK Stadium
Tickets: $360 (2-day pass), $200 (1-day pass), under 12 free.
More info: Exact details of the ticket buying process have yet to be released

Hong Kong Sevens 2016

http://bcmagazine.smugmug.com/Bcene-photos/2015/HK-Sevens-2015-Sunday/48283437_RCVLxm#!i=3959200288&k=jnRfnZr&lb=1&s=A

The dates for the 2016 Hong Kong Sevens have been confirmed as the 8-10th April 2016

The Hong Kong Sevens are the 7th leg in the Sevens World Series
2015/16 HSBC World Rugby Sevens Series schedule
Round 1: Dubai: 3-4 December
Round 2: Cape Town: 12-13 December
Round 3: Wellington: 30 – 31 January
Round 4: Sydney: 6-7 February
Round 5: Las Vegas: 4, 5, 6 March
Round 6: Vancouver: 12-13 March
Round 7: Hong Kong: 8-9-10 April
Round 8: Singapore: 16-17 April
Round 9: Paris: 14-15 May
Round 10: London: 20-22 May *TBC

Hong Kong Sevens 2016
Date: 8-10 April 2016
Venue: HK Stadium
Tickets: tbc

Olympic Rugby Sevens Qualifier: 7-8 November, 2015

http://bcmagazine.smugmug.com/Bcene-photos/2015/HK-Womens-Sevens-HKFC-2015/48253501_bZdxnd#!i=3956038898&k=s9rDWmr

Tickets for the two day Asia Olympic Sevens Qualifier on the 7-8 November will go on sale in August priced at $360 for a 2 day pass and $200 for a day pass. The two day tournament will feature the men’s and women’s Rio2016 Asia qualification matches.

The winner heading to Rio to join New Zealand, Canada, Australia, Great Britain, Colombia, USA, France and hosts Brazil who have already booked their spots at the 2016 Olympic Games

Hong Kong Cup of Nations – 13, 17, and 21 November 2015

A new four team round-robin tournament will make it’s debut this November, when Portugal, Russia and Zimbabwe will travel to Hong Kong for the 15-a-side Hong Kong Cup of Nations. The World Rugby-sanctioned competition will feature six matches played over three days.

HKRFU General Manager of Performance Rugby Dai Rees is enthusiastic about the new tournament, saying, “We have been working with World Rugby for a number of years to formalise a competition for Performance 2 and 3 level unions to ensure that we play the number of annual matches recommended by World Rugby for countries that aspire to reach the Rugby World Cup. To reach the recommended seven to ten annual fixtures, we need to combine our Asia Rugby Championships campaign – which is four matches in the spring – with touring or bringing in international teams for home tests in November” said Rees.

Russia is the highest ranked team competing in the Cup of Nations, currently 19th in the World Rugby standings. Portugal is ranked 23 and Zimbabwe is 28. Hong Kong moved up two spots to 25th in the world after finishing second in the Asia Rugby Championship.

“The teams invited to participate in the Cup of Nations are all ranked between 18 and 28 in the world, providing broadly competitive fixtures for Hong Kong. All four teams, including Hong Kong, advanced deep into the 2015 Rugby World Cup qualification process but ultimately didn’t qualify. We want to play against teams just outside of the Rugby World Cup rankings, which is about the top 16 or 18 teams in the world, to engage in meaningful and competitive fixtures,” Rees added.

“From a scheduling standpoint, the rugby calendar will look quite good for Hong Kong with the Cup of Nations giving us another opportunity for intense competition at the beginning of our domestic season and six months on from the Asia Rugby Championship” Rees continued. “We want to push and pressurise ourselves over the coming few years. Having three teams of the calibre of Russia, Portugal and Zimbabwe coming here six months after the Asia Rugby Championship window will help us maintain intensity as we increasingly focus on our high-performance 15s programmes,” said Rees who sees these opportunities as really important for Hong Kong in preparation for the qualification campaign for Rugby World Cup 2019 in Japan.

Match schedules and venues will be announced in due course.

Lets hope that a similar women’s tournament can be arranged on the same dates!

Asia Rugby Championship 2015: South Korea 37-38 Hong Kong

A last-gasp try from Salom Yiu Kam-shing earned Hong Kong a narrow 38-37 victory over 13-man South Korea in Incheon on Saturday to keep alive their hopes of finishing second in the inaugural Asia Rugby Championship.

Winger Yiu crossed over in extra-time to score his second try of the match under the posts and the successful conversion by Niall Rowark enabled Hong Kong to snatch victory over their opponents who had played the last 30 minutes with 14 men after a red-card was shown to tighthead prop Kim Kwang-sik for a shoulder charge on John Aikman.

The home team finished with 13 men on the park when centre Kim Nam-uk was sin-binned for an off-the-ball incident and the two-man advantage gave Hong Kong a renewed burst of hope as they grabbed their chance with Hong Kong lock forward Adrian Griffiths delivering the try-scoring pass to Yiu who covered 40 metres to score.

https://youtu.be/VxjuJteGe7s

Korea v Hong Kong Highlights ARC 2015 Week 5 (https://youtu.be/VxjuJteGe7s)

“It was a courageous performance from the guys. We made too many errors and dug a hole for ourselves but they showed a lot of heart to fight back,” said pleased head coach Andy Hall. “That last try certainly changed my post-match talk. But it was a lot of character which got us through in the end,” Hall added.

Korea, who had won the opening leg 33-26 last month at the Hong Kong Football Club, looked well on the way to securing another win as they stretched their 19-12 lead at halftime to 29-12. Roving flanker and captain Kim Jeong-min grabbed a brace in the first half, his second coming with Hong Kong down to 14 men with prop Jack Parfitt in the sin-bin for a shoulder charge. Korean right winger Bin Jegal also scored from a snappy move by the backs but Hong Kong reduced the deficit with Yiu going over from close range after taking a lovely inside pass from fly-half Ben Rimene.

A driving maul led to a try from flanker Toby Fenn as Hong Kong finished the first half on the ascendancy and trailing just by seven points. The second half began disastrously for the visitors when a loose pass from Lachlan Chubb was intercepted by Korean left winger Chang Yong-heung who ran 70 metres to score untouched.

Korea lost prop Kim Kwang-sik to a red card ten minutes into the second half but that did not deter the rest of the forwards who turned on the pressure giving fly-half Oh Youn-hyung plenty of time to knock over a drop-goal from 20 metres out.

Hong Kong cut the deficit to 29-17 when Tyler Spitz, who had come in for centre Jamie Hood in the first half, crossed over but Korea kept play inside the Hong Kong 22 and went further ahead, 32-17 with a penalty. Lock Paul Dwyer scored Hong Kong’s fourth try to cut the deficit again, 32-24, but the feisty Koreans refused to lie down with centre Kim Nam-uk going over to stretch the lead to 37-24.

Hong Kong skipper Hewson who had been in the thick of the action all day, gave his team renewed hope when he went over with two minutes on the clock to make it a one score match, 37-31. And when Kim Nam-uk was sin-binned right at the death, it gave Hong Kong a fresh burst of energy and they kept moving the ball around in the last passage of play before Yiu spotted the gap to score the winning try.

“The guys showed a lot of heart to win that match,” Hall said.

Both Hong Kong and Korea have eight points – Korea earning two bonus points despite the loss for scoring four tries or more and finishing within a seven-point margin – and the second-placed spot will only be decided after next Saturday’s final encounter between Hong Kong and Japan. Japan who have already been crowned champions will be favourites to remain unbeaten in the competition having beaten Hong Kong 41-0 in Tokyo. “Second-place will be down to points differential. But right now we are not thinking of that. We just want to savour this result,” Hall added.

Hong Kong have a +29 points differential on South Korea but will need to work hard to maintain that edge when the ever-dangerous Japan visit Aberdeen Stadium on Saturday (16.00, 23 May).

That match will be preceded by the final match in the Asia Rugby Women’s Championship when Hong Kong host Japan at Aberdeen (13.00). Kazakhstan lead the ARWC on 6 points over Japan on 5 points but Japan have a match in hand and an away win in Hong Kong would see them claim Asia’s women’s fifteens title next weekend.