Hong Kong baseball coach ‘loving’ dedicated players, sets new Asian Games target
Sean Au Hok-leung in fourth decade on city team staff and excited about squad’s talent and potential after breakthrough National Games
Veteran baseball head coach Sean Au Hok-leung has said Hong Kong’s players showed they could eventually snap at the heels of the traditional Asian powerhouses during a promising National Games campaign.
On their way to an eighth-place finish in Zhongshan, the city team beat Sichuan for a first-ever Games victory and lost by only one run to Fujian and Shandong.
Au’s squad was largely staffed by emerging talent, with only eight over-23s permitted and just five of those allowed on the field in each match.
“We had prepared for several years, and I told the players to show their talent to the whole of China, and that Hong Kong can have a good baseball team,” said Au, whose collection of part-timers were battling with professionals on the mainland.
“We were very happy with the young players … in three to five years, we have the potential to be doing well on the international stage.”
Au said it would be impossible in that time frame to attain the levels of world No 1 side Japan, Chinese Taipei (2), South Korea (4) and China (17), but he aimed to “be the top team in Asia outside those four”.