Major development on the cards for Hong Kong women’s rugby
HKRU appoints two full-time experts to develop fast-growing sector
Women’s rugby – the fastest-growing sector of the game in Hong Kong – has been given a major boost with the appointment of two full-time experts to help develop it even further.
Jo Hull, previously involved in senior women’s development with the Scottish Rugby Union, has joined the Hong Kong Rugby Union (HKRU) as women’s rugby performance manager. She will also take over with immediate effect as senior coach of the Hong Kong women’s fifteens squad.
Joining Hull is one of Hong Kong rugby’s most accomplished and respected former players, Sam Feausi, who is the HKRU’s new women’s rugby development manager.
Feausi won caps for Hong Kong at both sevens and fifteens and adds a deep local understanding to the broader international experience of Hull, who coached Scotland at the 2006 Women’s Rugby World Cup and acted as their performance manager at the World Cup four years later.
WATCH: Hong Kong’s women players and coaches prepare for their exciting future:
In addition to her role with the national team, Hull will be tasked to look after all the international squads outside of the women’s sevens programme, which is co-ordinated by Hong Kong Sports Institute coaches Gareth Baber and Anna Richards.
So far Hull has been impressed by what she has seen and believes Hong Kong has what it takes to rise to the forefront of Asian rugby and beyond.
“Many tier-one unions with high performance women’s teams don’t have full-time staff. Even the New Zealand Rugby Union only recently engaged a women’s rugby strategic manager,” she said.
Under the stewardship of the HKRU, the women’s game has come a long way from its humble beginnings – a solitary tens competition – and now includes a sizeable network of fifteens and tens competitions catering to players of all standards.
There are also development and age-grade programmes, including U19 and U16 set-ups, and an academy for younger girls. A new U20 women’s sevens team, coached by Feausi, was established in 2015.
“It is really an exciting time for women’s rugby,” said Feausi. “Now we have an opportunity to foster this growth and focus on enhancing the profile of the fifteens game.”
Both Hull and Feausi have hit the ground running, working closely on the domestic side of the game to encourage participation, develop talent and raise playing standards to an international level.
HKRU general manager of performance rugby said it wasn’t always the plan to recruit two full-time staff. “Initially we were looking to fill a single role but we were ultimately able to identify two world-class candidates in Jo and Sam,” he said.
“After discussions with the [HKRU] board, we felt that creating two mutually supporting positions would increase our opportunity to achieve our goals. Both have immersed themselves in the challenge and their appointments have created a lot of excitement in the community.”
