Match Report

With an assortment of pre-season injuries and accidents through overindulgence we only had a squad of 11 (+ 2 players from Macau). Added to this the HKRFU only sent an email at 2.30pm with a change of venue to KP, where the Gaelic Games were in full swing so we had to wait until a field was free. Fortunately our opposition were equally inconvenienced and short of players. In fact they seemed to be mostly Macau players, so the Stingrays team we play later in the season are likely to be a completely different proposition.

Anyway, the game started slowly and was relatively even. However with a few missed tackles and a Small mistake (more on that later), we were down 3 tries to nil by halftime. With some stirring words we continued and out played them in the second half. There were a number of scoring opportunities and good running by father / son combination of JK and JK jnr. Riki (a big lad borrowed from Macau) finally went over in the corner from a 5 yard penalty where everyone and their mother knew (and it was professed so in English, Portuguese and Gaelic) that the ball was going to Riki.

Man of the match was young JK jnr. who is still a few weeks short of his 17th birthday... Fines went to Smally at scrum half who lost 2 no-push scrums against the head (and tried to blame other people for it), and Jordi when he managed to kick and chase the ball ahead of the chasing defenders and could have kicked to score a beautiful goal through the empty Gealic football goalposts, but instead fired it wide. Randy should have been fined for not getting penalised at the breakdown all game.

So some cobwebs cleared and tackles put in, but next Saturday's game against University is likely to be much tougher... bring it on!