Rugby Recognized as Official Sport by USFHK
June 23, 2008

Rugby was formally admitted as an official university sport by The University Sports Federation of Hong Kong, China (USFHK) early this month, which successfully ended three years of probation.

From now on, rugby teams will be recognized as a university sports team rather than a social club.

“Contact rugby within Hong Kong's Tertiary institutes is relatively new compared to traditional sports. It is currently in its forth year, so to be accepted as an official USFHK Sport within this time is a great achievement,” said Andrew Li, club development officer of the Hong Kong Rugby Football Union.

“We hope that it will raise the profile and importance of rugby within all of Hong Kong's Tertiary institutes, as institutes can now pick up championship points for entering teams into the USF Rugby Tournament.”

The move was prompted by Simon Lo Hing-yeung, of the Institute of Human Performance from the University of Hong Kong, who put forth a proposal to the USFHK asking for rugby to be officially recognized.
“There has been a steady increase in tertiary players in the last three years. This move has promoted rugby from being an interest group to a university sports team. The benefits are wide-ranging because rugby will now be budgeted into their university budget and rugby players may also get priority in booking pitches for training,” Li said.

Young players will also benefit, because they will have the chance to carry on playing rugby when they move on to tertiary education in Hong Kong.

“Our next step is to get women's rugby admitted as an official USF sport within the next two years. This year we had a total of six tertiary institutes enter a women's team into the USF Tournament, which is an excellent start,” Li said.

The Hong Kong Rugby Football Union would like to thank those who have supported the development of tertiary rugby, especially Stan Cinnamond, and everyone at University of Hong Kong, Standard Chartered Bank for their sponsorship, the Referees' Society, and Brandon Huang and Andrew Li on the HKRFU staff.