Hong Kong Football Thread (R)

First Division kicks off on 6th September

Member Clubs

• Citizen
• Convoy Sun Hei
• Eastern
• Fourway
• Happy Valley
• Kitchee
• Mutual
• NTR WF Tai Po
• Sheffies United
• South China
• TSW Pegasus
• Tuen Mun Progoal
• Xiangsue Eisiti

Competition Format

Each team plays the other teams twice, one home and one away game. The ticket profits go to the home team. If there are two matches in the same stadium on the day, the profits are shared between the two home teams.
Since most of the teams do not have a home ground, the games are mostly played in Hong Kong Stadium or Mongkok Stadium. It happens that one team plays their home games in both stadiums in the same season.
The bottom two teams are relegated to the Hong Kong Second Division League.
Each season, HKFA would decide the maximum number of foreign and mainland Chinese players each club can have and how many can play in each game.

Cup Competitions

• Hong Kong Senior Shield
• Hong Kong FA Cup
• Hong Kong League Cup
• HKFA Chairmans Cup
• Hong Kong Viceroy Cup
• Guangdong-Hong Kong Cup
• Lunar New Year Cup
• HK-Shanghai Interclub Championship

The Hong Kong FA can't even decide if the opening game between South China and Citizen will happen during the day or in the evening.

Two teams relegated... haha... that does not happen. Only Division 1 is professional, Division 2 and below are all amateurs. With almost zero prize money or TV income, where are the Division 2 teams going to find the millions required to turn pro? Some Division 2 winners don't even want to actually move up. So many times the FA invited the relegated teams to stay.

The HK First Division is among the lowest level in terms of organization.

It is a bit of a funny country for football.

They seem to do well in backing competitions like the ING Cup for international youth sides and then they had the FA Premier League Asia Cup a couple of years back, so they have support here, but just not for their local league system.

It's funny, that i was reading that the Army and Police teams could never get relegated because their players would have to go on military service, etc, so they would get thumped every week but still stay in the top flight, even though this would weaken the league.

South China, the biggest team in the league, should of been relegated once, but pleaded with the FA to keep them in Division One, which they did, simply because they would be missed in the top flight, but if they were not good enough that season, then they should have been dismissed. And this is a league that AFC want to see do well so they can play in Champions League.

I am not sure about the part where "AFC want to see do well so they can play i Champions League". But HK League is surely very funny. By the way, Army and Police are no longer playing in Division 1 today.

Yes, our local NOW TV paid billions for the rights of English Premier League, because it is hugely popular over here. But few people give a damn about the local league.

South China has the biggest fan base, on avearge they bring in 2,000+ fans. The rest are quite hopeless except maybe Tai Po FC, who will play at home from this season and can expect more spectators.

There are really no home/away in HK because the government wants every game to be played in Mongkok. (HK Stadium is used like the way England uses Wembley.) That way they don't have to pay for the refurbishments of other grounds and save costs. So for the fans all the teams apart from South China and Tai Po are basically the same and do not represent anything meaningful.

It will take a revolution to change the entire football system to be more conventional.

Round 1 Fixtures - W/C 6th September

South China - Citizen (Hong Kong Stadium)
Eastern - Happy Valley (Mong Kok Stadium)
TSW Pegasus - Kitchee (Mong Kok Stadium)
Tuen Mun Progoal - NTR WF Tai Po (Mong Kok Stadium)
Mutual - Xiangxue Eisiti (Mong Kok Stadium)
Sheffies Utd - Convoy Sun Hei (Mong Kok Stadium)

Exactly, they play every game in Mongkok except the opener. Mongkok hosts 100 games or so per season (8 months or so)... surprisingly the grass there is always green.

Even after taking in sponsorship money, the HKFA won't pay to turn the giant TV screen on at HK Stadium for the opening game, because they think South China AA will want it and in the end SCAA will pay to turn it on. I guess it is fair business decision but not very nice.

By the way, TSW Pegasus, supposed to be based in Yuen Long, will get to play a home game because South China AA agreed to go and play them there. The HKFA has previously rejected the idea because Yuen Long grass there is not up to standard... when the whole stadium is under refurbishment!

News about the National Team ?

There is no news about the national team. It is set to play the 2011 AFC Asian Cup qualifiers in January 2009, yet no plans for the team has been announced, except that a League XI with almost no HK players will play in the Chinese New Year Cup in HK, so that the national team can concentrate on the qualifiers.

We want to see some friendly games for the HK Team this autumn, so they can prepare better, but so far no plans have been announced by HKFA.

For Sheffies Utd, as previously mentioned, please note that they should be called Sheffield United, they are owned by the English club who also own Chengdu Blades in China and a few over clubs around Europe.

The league began on Saturday. Heavyweight South China could only manage a 1-1 draw with Citizen. Goal by Detinho. About 2,500 attended the game at the 40,000 capacity HK Stadium. I guess live TV broadcast and possible bad weather has a lot to do with it.

This afternoon Happy Valley and Eastern AA played to a 0-0 draw; then newcomer TSW Pegasus lost 0-1 to another powerhouse Kitchee. 2,700 or so attended. Today is also HK's legislative council election day, not sure if it affected attendance though.

I guess no Premier League games on TV, so that has not affected attendances, hopefully there will be an upturn next week.

The rest of week one gets underway on Tuesday. I will bring a round up of results then.


Angsa - Have you seen any of the action?

I saw the South China vs Citizen game on TV. South China played poorly, there was simply no organization, they kept sending high balls into the box hoping that Tales Schutz, Chan Siu Ki or Detinho would get one in and Detinho did in the end.

TSW Pegasus is said to have played very well against Kitchee and had penalty claims turned down. They were unlucky to lose. They will play Convoy Sunhei in their next game.

Tai Po FC will play tomorrow and again this Saturday. Tai Po will be playing at their home ground on Sat and it is great to see. HK league really need to turn into a true home/away format.

I like your view on the domestic game, something, i am not qualified to talk upon. Ufortunatley i will not get to see any of the action being in the UK,

I think the league in Hong Kong could be strong if it was to be given a bit more of a professional feel. I feel it's a league that could really do well in it's own right, given the correct finanicial backing, which i think it could get if people took their eyes of European football once in a while
It will be interesting to see the mixture of attandances when clashing with English Premier League games.

For one, i feel the FA can get more involved. For example, the FA should make all sides who enter, have their own ground, thats one just for a start, but not just force it,but help the clubs, then, like you say, can play on a home and away basis and build some kind of supporter basis and make a bit of rivallry.

Clubs themselves, could maybe even use the American MLS as some kind of format, where teams play for Supporters shields, and increase rivalry between teams.

For example, a bottom end of table clash could see a game having a bit more importance, as they play to see who is the winner of the Citizen Shield or something, basically a one off game between two sides. But MLS has it in numerous games and makes meaningless games a bit more livliy. Now these are not just games picked at random, but games played between clubs with rivailried from over the years.

Anther thing i would like to see is the FA promote the game a bit more. Numerous times I have checked the official website and don't seem to se much of the domestic game, but only the national team, or tournements for other national teams being played in HK.

One last thing, the AFC kind of see the league asa role model to feel it's criteria to play in the AFC Pro League. Basically, with the money in HK, they can have better infrastructure than most, so they fill a lot of the AFC's boxes. They might not be as good on the field, but Air port
structure, road structure must be up their with the best in Asia(??), so once all teams have a stadium each, then they will be well on their way to Pro league standard, and then comes the football side!

It is great to see someone with so many suggestions for our league.

The teams that play in HK, with the exception of Tai Po, TSW Pegasus and Tuen Mun Progoal maybe, have no district connections and they claim to want to capture all HK football fans. This thinking is a legacy from the 50s and 60s when HK football was hugely popular locally and the 25,000 government stadium (now HK stadium) would sell out in a heartbeat.

The FA tried to force teams to play at local sports grounds before, but one of the games only attracted a "crowd" of 28 people. So they abandoned the idea. Basically, teams cannot be forced into becoming district teams. They have to want to do it and then try to promote themselves locally.

Mongkok stadium will be renovated next year, but the government will actually reduce its capacity to 6,000 from the current 8,500. They claim HK league does not require a bigger stadium according to recent attendance figures.

Actually there are good grounds all over HK which can be used. Tai Po is one. Siu Sai Wan has a capacity of 12,000 and is fully covered. Yuen Long needs work but it has a capacity of 5,000 and the district is football mad. Shatin has a ground with 5,000 capacity and the district team is strong and it is on the way up. Kowloon Bay, Aberdeen..etc. have also been mentioned. Tseung Kwan O Sports Ground will be ready next year. It is built for East Asian Games and it will have very good facilities, only problem is that its capacity is only 3,500, expandable to 5,000.

Your idea of Supporters Shield etc is very interesting. I imagine we can always make up something to suit our local fans. I guess we can create a New Territories Cup for Tai Po, Tuen Mun Progoal and TSW Pegasus to win.

Hong Kong has lots of money, but most of that money is spend on English Premier League. NOW TV paid billions for the broadcasting rights and every week billions are bet on the games through HK Jockey Club.

HK Jockey Club took in all this gambling cash and have so far invested $0 into HK football. They said they would build training grounds for HKFA, but so far nothing has materialised. I sent an email to ask HKJC about it and for two weeks nobody replied.

For the HK government to support local football, there must be a reason. They built all the superb Equestrian facilities because we are hosting the Olympics and Paralympics, otherwise our Equestrian facilities would not have been up to much. Therefore I hope HKFA will try to secure the rights to host a football tournament, like AFC Youth Cup or AFC U17 Cup etc. That will give the government the reason to improve all the football grounds in HK. HK teams always complain that they don't have good grounds to train on.

Yes, that's the kind of thing i mean. After all, during a league season, their can only be one winner, and in every league, you do get your games that mean nothing, so spectator support could run low.

Creating something meaningful, like you suggest would spice things up a bit and give the sides somethign to really play for. Being crowned the best in a New Territories Cup and giving the fans something to chant about.

Of course, you can push these things to far, so you have to keep to a minimum but it makes things that little bit more exciting.

For example, in my favorite league Thailand, we have the league of 16 sides, but only one can win. So we have a kind of un-official Bankers Cup, wheres as Krung Thai Bank and Bangkok Bank play each other to spice it up - it's now made these two middle table sides something to cheer about. The same is for the province sides have a bit of rivalry, as the league is mainly Bangkok based, so we have a one off game called Eastern Seaboard Cup between Coke-Bangpra and Chonburi, next seaason it looks like their neighbours Sriracha will be involved if promoted, to create a mini- 3 league system.

All is unofficial, but they get the crowd in and something to be proud about. For example, Chonburi are trhe bigger side, and over a 30 game season would always come out on top over Coke-Bangpra, but this year Coke-Bangpra are cheering after winnigng the Eastern Seaboard Cup, and creates a good bit of banter between 2 sides that fight in the league for all the different reasons championship and relegation).

Now i've contacted our FA before but all has gone on death ears, so it's just a local thing, but more sides are hoping to promote their games in this way. For example the Police and Navy sold thier match as being a Uniform Cup. Again, a few neutrals turned out to see who would win it, so aswell as having 3 points at stake, they saw a good cup game in action aswell. So in previous years the players would settle for a draw in the last 5-10 minutes, this time, we had a cracking last 10, as everyone wanted to get the trophy and snatch that vital goal.

On the downside, The FA are not too happy, as it takes away the importance of the league in some respects, but i think it can work either way

We just had this stupid Xiangxue team asking to host their games in a small park in Shenzhen. The HKFA people went to see it and were disgusted by what they saw on offer. They will now move Xiangxue's games to Mongkok and maybe Siu Sai Wan Sports Ground.

You would have thought that HKFA would check all the teams' stadiums before planning games at them. No, not this FA. They go by a very old rule book which should be burned and a new one written in its place.

NTR Wofoo Tai Po beat Tune Mun Progoal 3-0 last night. Mutual and Chengdu Blades drew 0-0.

Sheffield Utd drew 0-0 with Convoy Sun Hei today so all the games in round one have now been played.

A little bit surprised at the very low turn out's, attendances of 232 and 633 over the last couple of nights. Is this because it is a weekday fixture or simply because they are not followed by anyone that much?

Another clear fact from the results below, is the extreme lack of goals.

Round One Results

South China 1 - 1 Citizen (Hong Kong Stadium)
Eastern 0 - 0 Happy Valley (Mong Kok Stadium)
TSW Pegasus 0 - 1 Kitchee (Mong Kok Stadium)
Tuen Mun Progoal 0 - 3 NTR WF Tai Po (Mong Kok Stadium)
Mutual 0 - 0 Xiangxue Eisiti (Mong Kok Stadium)
Sheffies Utd 0 - 0 Convoy Sun Hei (Mong Kok Stadium)

Round Two fixtures

13.09 NTR WF Tai Po - Sheffield Utd (Tai Po Sports Ground)
13.09 Xiangxue Eisiti - Eastern (Mong Kok Stadium)
14.09 Kitchee - Mutual (Mong Kok Stadium)
14.09 Convoy Sun Hei - TSW Pegasus (Mong Kok Stadium)
15.09 Citizen - Tuen Mun Progoal (Mong Kok Stadium)
15.09 Happy Valley - Fourway (Mong Kok Stadium)

Well, playing on a weekday is surely a problem. But really nobody knows anything about Sheffield United except the team name, plus the fact that they are sending their youth team to the HK league for training. They are not marketing themselves in HK. Nobody really understands why HKFA allowed them to join, except they are paying HKFA money.

I suggest Sheffield Utd and Xiangxue Eisiti play at Siu Sai Wan or other sports ground for free to attract fans in other districts. They don't care about gate receipts anyway. (Xiangxue once said they would play in Shenzhen and open the gates to all fans for free. Turned out they were planning to play at a very lousy sports ground.)

I don't know why their is a lack of goals, I suppose it is early in the season and the teams have yet to gel.

By the way, I got a reply from HKJC:

"Being the Hong Kong's premier provider of sporting entertainment, we are strongly committed to the development of all types of sports, including local football and other long-term sports development projects in the community. For instance, we have already committed a fund of over HK$100 million to set up a new Football Academy in Tseung Kwan O."

We are still waiting for the Football Academy to materialize...

At least you got a reply, maybe it shows that HKFA do care about the fans. It's a start.

HKJC and HKFA will always give you a standard reply. They receive govt funding or special permit to operate, they must reply to all enquiries from the public.

Two league games yesterday, Tai Po FC played at home against Sheffield United and won 2:1. 1,135 fans attended the game. Reportedly great atmosphere. Way to go Tai Po!

Eastern AA played at Mongkok against Xiangxue Eisiti and only 157 fans came! Maybe because it clashed with the live broadcast of Man Utd vs Liverpool. Eastern won 1:0.

Disappointing attendance for Eastern, must have been the clash with the EPL, but i can't help but feel, why? Surely, see some live action and watch a repeat of the English game.

Great attendance for Tai Po and hopefully they can keep that going.

Today's games (14th Sept) saw Kitchee beat Mutual 3-1 with a hattrick from Paul Ngue and TSW Pegasus beat Convoy Sun Hei 2-1, both games being played at Mong Kok Stadium and attracted a decent 1,328 attendance

TSW Pegasus is becoming one of the more popular teams in the league already. I guess people are very emotional about helping out the much troubled Tin Shui Wai district, and are very glad to see they have a good football team.

I bet their home game on 5 October against 'sister team' South China AA will be a sell out. (Yuen Long Stadium can seat 5,000 people.)