Crouch, touch ... engage | Player diversity is key to growth and success of ‘team Hong Kong’
In recent weeks there have been a fair number of column inches devoted to the debate over the number of “foreigners” being selected for Hong Kong’s national football and rugby teams, and by and large this is quite understandably regarded in a negative light, blocking the pathway for local players to representative level. However ...
In recent weeks there have been a fair number of South China Morning Post column inches devoted to the debate over the number of “foreigners” being selected for Hong Kong’s national football and rugby teams.
And by and large this is quite understandably regarded in a negative light and is seen as blocking the pathway for local players to achieve representative level in their chosen sport.
Similar criticisms are regularly levelled at other Hong Kong sports such as cricket and hockey, and while all of us are genuinely striving to redress the balance we are currently some way off achieving the desired 96 per cent local Chinese representation that would accurately reflect the demographics of our society.
I was musing on this challenge when I came across the above photograph showing three youngsters who have spent the past two weeks in Portugal proudly representing the Hong Kong’s national men’s junior team in the World Rugby Under 20 Trophy.
While we must continue to work hard to put the pathways in place to get more local Chinese faces into our national sports teams, I hope we won’t inadvertently shut off equally important pathways that are being trod by non-ethnic Chinese Hong Kongers
All three were born and brought up in Hong Kong and all learned their rugby through the Operation Breakthrough programme.
