Hong Kong handball getting more respect than ever before, men’s captain Tse says
A 10th place at the Asian Championship after a dream run at National Games has changed the way people view the sport, Freddie Tse says
Hong Kong handball captain Freddie Tse Wing-fai said the attention generated by his side’s National Games run had changed the way the sport was seen in the city, pointing to the interest generated by the Asian Men’s Championship.
Set a target of finishing 11th at the biennial tournament in Kuwait, the team went one better last week, and that was three places higher than they managed at the 16-team competition in 2024.
And Tse, who was competing at the championship for a fourth time, said that as well as opposition teams starting to respect his side more, there had been a jump in the number of children wanting to take up the game.
“The Asian Championships only come around every two years, and in the past, we basically had to promote the event ourselves,” he said. “Now people are asking where they can watch it, wanting to support the team.
“It’s a far cry from the old days when nobody was paying attention and it felt like we were fighting for recognition from a long way behind.”
Tse, who also works as a handball coach, said any significant improvement in the team would only come with more people playing the game. After the boost of the surprise fourth-place finish in November, the next target was qualifying for this year’s Asian Games.