Let me explain, in case you don’t already know, what The Hong Kong Soccer Sevens is. The clues are in the name, yes it’s played in Hong Kong (annually) and yes this is a seven a side football tournament (not the sport with odd shaped balls that is so commonly connected with Hong Kong), played on a regulation 11 a side size field at it’s spiritual home The Hong Kong Football Club at the heart of Happy Valley (maybe more famous for it’s horse racing) on Hong Kong island.

The tournament is split between the main tournament and the Masters. The masters has seen numerous world stars of football come to show off their talent (albeit at a slower pace). All I can say is that to see some of these players it epitomises the anecdote “form is temporary, class is permanent “. The tournament has been graced by Didier Six, Lothur Matthias, Jean-Marc Bosman, Andy Cole, Peter Beardsley, Des Walker the list goes on and on.

Rumors are always rife before the tournament about which teams will come and play. In years gone by the regulars were always Rangers and Celtic of the Scottish league and Aston Villa of the English Premier league. Due (I am lead to believe) to financial constraints, this year we would not have the Scottish representatives at the tournament and they would be replaced with some other teams. Other teams that have participated in the past are Manchester Utd, Arsenal, Liverpool, Chelsea, Manchester City, The Kaiser Chiefs, Boca Juniors, Urawa Red Diamonds, Guangzhou Evergrande, Shanghai SIPG, the Australian National U21’s it’s a long list of quality teams from all corners of the globe.

After you run through this amazing list you go down to the lesser known (to the world outside of Hong Kong) professional teams of Hong Kong’s Premier League, BC Rangers, Kitchee FC and then going down another level, teams made from players at the Hong Kong Football Club who participate in the professional leagues of Hong Kong but maintain their amateur status, after this is the second Hong Kong Football Club team The Captains Select made up of those “left over” (for want of a better phrase, no disrespect) first team players and then players from their amateur league teams.

Then last but not least, bringing up the rear of all of this are the whipping boys of the tournament, the no hopers who come to make up the numbers and play for the privilege of being on the same pitch as future football legends, The Yau Yee League Select. A team comprised of players from Hong Kongs longest serving amateur league. School teachers, bankers, insurers, desk jockeys, publicans, bar staff, bar “proper-uppers”, players from every walk of life there is in Hong Kong and general lovers of the peoples game.

I’m not entirely sure how the coach selection process was done by the Yau Yee League before, but this year it was agreed that the process to find a coach(s) for the coming sevens tournament for the Yau Yee League Select team would start with an advertisement on the leagues website.

The request for interested parties to make application for the unpaid position to coach the Yau Yee League Select team went up on the leagues website with only a couple of weeks left of the season.

I’d like to think that my experience and coaching qualifications from the Football Federation Australia and the English FA put me in with a chance. The other string to my bow, as I suggested in my application, was my experience of coaching sevens football to numerous youth teams over the last many, many years of my professional coaching career. It might be little league, but believe me when I say the standard is very high, both technically and tactically.

A week later and I received an email from Matt Seddon (Yau Yee League representative and Select team manager) telling me the good news that I had been selected, along with James Dean (another coaching professional) to plan for and coach the team that would compete in this years tournament. Tommy Vincent (Yau Yee League representative) completed the Yau Yee League Selects management “dream team” for the coming tournament.

James and I were brought together supposedly to pick out some “canon fodder” for the pro teams arriving in Hong Kong in around 7 weeks time. Obviously this was due to the outstanding resumes, credentials and experience both James and myself possessed. I was later to find out (true or not?) that we were the only two people who had applied, so I guess we were the perfect candidates for the job.

It was then released which teams would be coming to the tournament and among the expected Aston Villa (five times champions) West Ham Utd, Leicester City, Newcastle Utd there were some new big names to the tournament, Stoke City and Athletico Madrid. We were ecstatic when the draw was made.

So trying to cut this (what is becoming a longer than expected) long story short, we had around 6 weeks to cut down a squad of over 40 nominated players to a squad of ten and coach them for what we wanted to try and achieve in the tournament (preferably something a little better than “cannon fodder”).

#believe

After day one of the tournament was complete, we took some praise from the tournament organisers on their social media page.

We had defied the odds and through victories over Stoke City and Hong Kong’s National U20’s Team, we had shaken off our “cannon fodder” status, had knocked Stoke and Hong Kong out of the Cup competition and we were through to the next round along side Athletico Madrid, who had a lucky 2-1 victory over us after coming from behind with the aid of light penalty (my story, my poetic licence!)

The results :

Yau Yee League Selcet 2-0 Stoke City

Athletico Madrid 2-1 Yau Yee League Select

Hong Kong National U20 1-2 Yau Yee League Select

So this put us into the Cup competition to play West Ham Utd, which although we had a few chances, West Ham took an early lead, sat on their one goal lead for most of the game and deserved their 1-0 win. (https://youtu.be/rgM53HQ5nmY?t=1357)

This put us directly into the Shield competition and set us up for a dream semi final against Aston Villa, the one team that had won this tournament more than any other team and we took them all the way to extra time and penalties where our goal keeper (Eugene Kan) has earned himself legend status and received an honourable mention at the post tournament dinner https://youtu.be/sw1_6SeHPcE?t=4810

“The Crazy Gang have beaten the culture club”

Would you believe it, the part timers from the “friendly league” of Hong Kong have knocked out the five times Champions of the Hong Kong Soccer Sevens and the one club that has produced more England Internationals than any other. The Yau Yee League Select marches to the final of the Shield competition.

The final proved to be a bridge just a little too far. Although we stayed in contention throughout, had a couple of good chances denied on the line, had a good penalty appeal turned down, we just couldn’t quite beat the professionals for the winners medal. BC Rangers played well throughout, had strength and experience in their team (along side some up-coming youth) and had scored a couple of good goals.

Yau Yee League Select 1-3 BC Rangers

Our guys gave everything they had left all the way to the end and the final 3-1 score line flatters to deceive our opposition who scored their final goal deep into added time when the game was already won.

I could not be prouder of our all round team performance and looking back at training on hill tops in thunder and lightning storms, standing in one inch deep of “black rain” water, I am now 100% sure the football gods were smiling on us all the way back then.

During a long a painful Covid lockdown in Hong Kong, I pieced this little memento together of the fun we had.