Ajax of Asia? Fallen Hong Kong giants Kitchee model rebuild on European royalty
- Forward Poon Pui-hin in talks over mainland switch, but loan move being held up by ‘procedural problem’
Hong Kong football’s fallen giants Kitchee are to refocus on becoming the “Ajax of Asia”, after appointing Edgar Cardoso as head coach to lead a new-look, bright, young team.
Club president Ken K Ng has also hit back at accusations he strung along some of the club’s former stars by delaying telling them they were no longer wanted, saying he feared they would “give up” if they knew before the end of the season.
Champions in the previous three completed seasons, Kitchee slumped to fourth in 2023-24. They blew two late-season opportunities for cup success, as an acrimonious campaign spectacularly unravelled. Ng promptly decided to dispense with a longstanding model of relying on ageing imports, in favour of trusting young, predominantly homegrown, talent.
He said Cardoso, previously the Kitchee academy’s director of elite football, “fits the profile” for the club’s renewed model.
A number of players were shown the door last month, with some privately relating disappointment over being kept waiting for news about their fates.
“If I tell a player I am not going to keep them, they will give up,” Ng said. “At the end of April, we were chasing every trophy, at the end of May, we’d lost all of them.