Greater Bay Area expansion key to driving Hong Kong football’s future on and off the pitch, says game’s new chief
- New Hong Kong Football Association chairman Eric Fok believes the National Games in 2025 will lead to deeper ties in the region
- The latest member of the Fok dynasty to hold the position, he plans to be more hands on than previous generations
Hong Kong football needs to look beyond the city and instead make use of the vastly untapped market in the Greater Bay Area as a source for development, newly elected Football Association chairman Eric Fok Kai-shan said.
As the third generation of the “Fok” football dynasty, the 40-year-old Eric Fok was elected unopposed in June when his father, Timothy Fok Tsun-ting, stepped down as president of the city’s football governing body after 26 years.
Timothy Fok’s father, Henry, a well-known business tycoon in Hong Kong, was the first local of Chinese descent to become president of the association in 1970, before passing the baton to his son 27 years later. Henry Fok, who died in 2003, was also an Asian Football Confederation executive committee member for 18 years.
While the two senior Foks adopted a hands-off policy when it came to their stewardship of the game, a new approach is coming and Eric Fok is determined to move the sport forward.
“Hong Kong football has a long history but as time goes on we also need new thoughts and initiatives to bring it forward and promote it [as] more than a game of 22 footballers but as an industry, a business,” Fok said in an exclusive interview with the Post.
In Fok’s view, the Greater Bay Area, an economic zone encompassing Hong Kong, Macau and nine cities on the mainland, has the potential to drive football to greater heights, on and off the pitch.
