Monaghan hails ‘special’ Hong Kong women after historic performance ends in defeat against Japan
- Sevens team progress beyond pool stages of qualifying tournament for first time, but lose in quarter-finals
- Japan are team we aspire to be says coach, who praises team for improving game by game
Hong Kong women’s coach Iain Monaghan hailed his side’s “special” performance after they made it past the pool stages of the World Sevens Series qualifying tournament for the first time.
Opening day losses to Kenya and Papua New Guinea were offset by a 26-5 win over Uganda in pool B, which earned them a spot in Friday’s quarter-finals against Japan, the tournament’s top seeds.
Monaghan’s team gave the Japanese side a run for their money, but ultimately fell short, losing 27-7.
Still, the Scotsman, who only took charge of the side in January, felt his side had improved with every game they played.
“I said at the start of the tournament that we wanted to do something special, and we did something that no Hong Kong [women’s] team has ever done,” he said.
“We had some changes during the week with some players not making it, but we still believed in the squad we had. Our girls showed they can learn quick, and they really improved game by game.”
For Monaghan, Japan are the team he wants Hong Kong to be.
“They are a quality side that we aspire to be as good as, or better than them, in the future,” he said.
Hong Kong captain Melody Li called the display against Japan the team’s best of the tournament, “by far”.
“I think we matched up with them evenly on offence and defence – we just need to work on some critical things,” Li said.
“For example, we lost quite a few of kick-offs which gave them a lot of extra possession.”
Chong Ka-yan, who scored Hong Kong’s only try against in the defeat at Hong Kong Stadium, felt that her side had made things tough against Japan.
“It felt amazing [scoring a try] in front of the Hong Kong supporters, especially my family and loved ones,” she said.
“When I scored I was not focused on myself, but lifting the team up and putting some pressure on the Japanese team. We did not want them to think it was an easy game and we made things tough on them.”
Scrum-half Jessica Ho Wai-on believes that her team are not that far away from being able to beat Japan, who lost to Scotland 24-19 in the semi-finals.
“We showed that we could pressure them on defence, which is why they weren’t able to score on us for the first few minutes,” Ho said. “And all of the tries they scored were on the outside bar one. To be able to force a team like that out wide was really great for us.
“We are still a young team, so we just need to continue watching other teams and learning from them and there’s no doubt that we will continue keep getting better.”
