Hong Kong’s football friendly against Malaysia has been cancelled after the Southeast Asian nation claimed its “incapability of visiting Hong Kong”. The match was scheduled to take place at the 40,000-seat Hong Kong Stadium on October 15, five days after Hong Kong play Iraq in Basra in the 2022 World Cup Asian zone qualifiers. The Hong Kong Football Association (HKFA) said the Malaysians gave sudden notice of their withdrawal on Wednesday. A HKFA spokesman said they had tried to convince Malaysia to change their mind but to no avail. “The Hong Kong Football Association (HKFA) regrets to announce that the international friendly match between Hong Kong and Malaysia, which is scheduled on 15 October 2019 is now cancelled after Football Association of Malaysia submitted a written notice to HKFA on 25 September 2019, announcing that their incapability of visiting Hong Kong. “The HKFA understands fans’ expectation for all Hong Kong representative team home matches and attempted to negotiate with the Malaysia side, however both sides failed to reach any positive results at the end,” the statement said. Tiny Solomon Islands now ranked ahead of Hong Kong in latest Fifa men’s rankings The HKFA said tickets bought for the match will be fully refunded including the service charge. Refund arrangement will be announced shortly. Although Malaysia didn’t clearly state why they were withdrawing from the match, it is understood the social unrest in the city was the main reason for their no-show. The football friendly is the latest sports event that has been cancelled due to the ongoing protests. In the past month, the Hong Kong Tennis Open, the Clearwater Bay Golf Open and last week’s football Charity Community Cup have been axed due to the protests. Hong Kong Tennis Open postponed as protest disruption claims another sporting event Last Wednesday, the Jockey Club also called off its evening race meeting at Happy Valley after protesters called for action against pro-Beijing lawmaker Junius Ho Kwan-yiu whose horse was expected to race in the opening race of the meeting. Hong Kong coach Mixu Paatelainen was hoping to use the Malaysia game as a warm up for their World Cup qualifying matches against Bahrain and Cambodia on November 14 and 19 respectively.