First Test Against Hong Kong Chinese Team Today

Press, Volume XCI, Issue 27688, 18 June 1955, Page 4

First Test Against Hong Kong Chinese Team Today

ASSOCIATION FOOTBALL

The Hong Kong Association football team, which will play its first test match against New Zealand at Lancaster Park today, represents the South China Athletic Associatioa and is the second team from China to visit the Dominion. In 1924 a Chinese Universities Association team played four tests against New Zealand. It lost three and drew one, but it was the style of football, more than results of matches played, that made the team so popular. The Hong Kong team played its first match against Auckland last Saturday. It established an early lead of 2-0 and was later at a disadvantage when Auckland made the score 4-2, but it impressed by its fighting finish which made the game a draw. The Hong Kong team with its uniform of red shirt, white sleeves, blue cuffs and collar, white shorts, red and white hooped socks and red leather boots, should be one of the most colourful to appear on Lancaster Park. A. very light team by New Zealand standards, Hong Kong makes up in science what it lacks in physique and showed in Auckland that weight and strength were not everything in the make-up of a good Association Football player. Before coming to New Zealand Hong Kong played six matches in Manila against Filipino teams winning five and drawing one against a Chinese team. The South China Athletic Association is the foremost of the 100 teams playing Soccer in Hong Kong. Their

average age is 24J and their average height sft 7|in. They are all amateurs in the strictest sense of the word. The Lancaster Park Oval is expected to be in good order and with a fine day the exhibition of football may surprise many not familiar with soccer. Although the New Zealand team will have a big advantage in height and weight it should be remembered that the players have not been together before on the field of play and have had no chances to develop the combination which is the big feature in the play of the Hong Kong team. The game, which will commence at 3 p.m., will be contested by the following players:— Hong Kong Goal-keeper: Pau King-yin. Backs: Lau Che-ping (right), Lau Yee. Halves: Tang Sum, Yo Po-keung (captain), Szeto Yiu. Forwards: Chu Wing-klung, Ho Cheung-ayu, Lee Yuk-tak, Yiu Cheukyin, Mok Chun-wah. New Zealand Goal-keeper: J. Stevenson. Backs: T. Cooper, G. Dick. Halves: D. Charlton (captain), A. Laffey, H. Grootelaar. Forwards: J. Sharpe, F. Benge, R. King, K. Fleet (vice-captain), C. Steele Reserves: J. Adams and M. Walker. The curtain-raiser at 1.30 p.m. will! be played by teams from Christchurch I Boys’ High School and Christchurch' West High SchooL I