Rugby Union says Hong Kong Stadium needs 10,000 more seats to stay competitive

The Hong Kong Stadium must add at least 10,000 seats to its present 40,000 capacity if the city is to remain an attractive destination for major rugby and soccer events, a leading sports figure has warned.

Brian Stevenson, the president of the Hong Kong Rugby Football Union, has called on the government for a "longer-term" solution to remedy the stadium's shortcomings, including improving the state of the pitch and increasing capacity to at least 50,000.

"We cannot afford to look after our national stadium on a care and maintenance budget as is the case now," Stevenson said. "This will be our premier stadium until 2019 or 2020, and we have to find a way to make it bigger and better so that we can remain competitive on the international scene."

A major worry for the union is that with capacity restricted to 40,000, it stands to lose out on tens of millions of dollars over the next seven years on ticket revenue from the Sevens.

With the government still undecided on the way forward for the proposed Kai Tak sports centre and how it would be financed, Stevenson said rugby and soccer were resigned to the fact they would have to deal with the Hong Kong Stadium for at least the next seven years but it was time for a major refurbishment of the venue last redeveloped in 1994.

"We cannot only look at issues like putting in new turf. Going forward, the restricted capacity until 2020 could become a major issue for the Hong Kong Sevens. We must look at ways of increasing our capacity if our premier sporting tournament is to safeguard its leading status," said Stevenson, who is also the chairman of the Hong Kong Jockey Club.