An anxious Hong Kong Cricket Association (HKCA) is to lobby international authorities after being handed a potentially devastating eligibility snub by the Asian Cricket Council (ACC).
The ACC has stunned local officials by rejecting pleas to recognise Hong Kong permanent identity card holders as 'citizens' as defined by the International Cricket Council (ICC).
According to the ICC, international teams must field a minimum of seven players who are either born in the country they wish to represent or who are citizens of that country.
The broad ICC definition of a citizen is someone entitled to a passport of the country they wish to represent.
That has caused problems for Hong Kong because SAR passports are available only to ethnic Chinese.
The immediate effect of the ACC ruling is that Hong Kong have been forced to tinker with their squad for next month's ACC Trophy in Nepal, axing players from the provisional 18-man squad in favour of locally-born players.