Hugo Stiles must step up for depleted Valley

Hong Kong under-20 captain Hugo Stiles must attempt to spark a depleted Societe General Valley when they travel to The Rock on Saturday in their hunt for the Broony Quaich.

Valley will be missing all their sevens stars as well as explosive new winger David Vainqueur, and head coach Jack Isaac is pinning his hopes on Stiles and the rest to stop the unbeaten run of Bloomberg Hong Kong Scottish.

"There isn't that much of him, but Hugo is a sharp little player and very courageous. He has added a bit of spark to our backline," said Isaac, who has been forced to change his line-up to accommodate injury as well as the missing sevens players.

Forward Nick Hewson and backs Lee Jones, Salom Yiu Kam-shing and Max Woodward will be on duty for Hong Kong in the final leg of the Asian Sevens Series in Beijing this weekend.

Their absence will leave a big hole, and it has been made worse in the backs with Vainqueur out with a sore thumb. In the forwards, Valley will be missing number eight Ben Davey as well as flankers Alex Baddeley and Thomas Lamboley. "We will be missing a host of players, but the rest of the guys are working well with the general level across the squad being pretty good as people are stepping up," said Isaac.

Valley will field Ryan Meacheam and Matt Rosslee in midfield with Stiles likely to man the last line of defence as they plot a way to get past a Hong Kong Scottish defence who have not conceded a try in the past two games.

"We haven't seen a lot of the sevens guys anyway this season, so we will have to continue on our own merry way," Ryan said.

Isaac believes patience and ball conservation will be the key to inflicting a first defeat on Hong Kong Scottish.

"They have a very good defence and it will be hard to get through them, so it will be a matter of wearing them down," said Isaac.

Hong Kong Scottish will be determined to keep the Broony Quaich at home after successfully defending it for the first time against Kowloon last Saturday.

"It was great to get the monkey off our backs of never having retained the Broony Quaich with that win over Kowloon. We want to ensure we improve our home form this season," said Hong Kong Scottish general manager Dave Whiteford.

"We have won three out of three, but the most pleasing thing is that we haven't played anywhere close to our best in all three games, so there is a lot left in the tank," warned Whiteford.