AG-17 – HONG KONG CRICKET CLUB
In a city of Skyscrapers, where land is sold at a premium, some children play cricket on the rooftop of a high rise building. This is Hongkong and cricket has been played on this island since 1841. Hong Kong Cricket club was established in 1851 and is the oldest club in Asia.
Present Address :
Hongkong Cricket Club,
137, Wong nai Chung gap road ,
Tai Tam, HONG KONG
Photo courtesy : living.hongkonghomes.com
This club played inter-port matches against Shanghai in 1866 and in Srilanka ( Ceylon) in 1890. In 1892 the ship SS Bokhara carrying Hong Kong Cricket players was capsized by a tycoon and only two of the 13 Cricketers survived in that tragedy.
The club moved from its Charter Road premises to a ground in Victoria business district overlooking Happy Valley Race course in the mid-1970s. The present ground at Wong Nai Chung Gap is in the middle of the Island. The Club has a Long Room resembling Lord’s cricket ground, London.
MCC teams touring Australia and New Zealand frequently played a match in Hong Kong against ex-pats living on the island.
The Hong Kong Cricket Sixes organised by Hong Kong Cricket League in 1961 has become a regular feature for professional cricketers.
In the 1990s Dermot Reeve, an England Cricketer, who was born in Hong Kong captained a successful Cricket Sixes team. The game was shown in SKY SPORTS TV series.
In 1983 a team from Hong Kong played a 3- match series in Beijing, the first of such a visit to the Communist China.
Hong Kong Cricket team became an Associate member of ICC in 1969. In the T20 WC tournament in 2014, Hong Kong team stunned the Bangladesh Team when they beat them by 2 wickets.
Hong Kong CC also showed interest in social activities. In partnership with Zubin Foundation it has distributed 5,000 second hand books and 10,000 masks to 800 families in and around Hong Kong.
Besides Cricket, rugby, tennis, squash, Lawn Bowls, Pool, Gym, Dance Classes ( from Balley to Scottish Country) and other sports facilities are also played here.
Hong Kong CC is a prestigious club as the Entrance Fees itself costs $ 2,88,00 with a monthly fee of $ 1,660 and the waiting period is 7 years and those who win a place in main sports like Cricket, Lawn Bowls, Squash, Tennis will get accelerated sporting membership.
At present this club has 2,300 members.
The club aso conducts Umpiring Course by arrangement with ICC. This year it will be conducted in March & April.
Hong Kong CC ‘s Fair Break event, a T-20 tournament, attracts international women cricketers around the world.
The Club’s Mission statement goes like this : “ We will engage, educate, and inspire through programmes and initiatives that reflect our diverse, vibrant community, also providing professional structures and pathways to support the identification and development of talented cricketers to ensure Hong Kong is represented by champion teams “.10
Cricket features in the Asian Games for the first time and Hong Kong’s men’s and women’s teams participate in the 16th Asian Games in Guangzhou, China in November 2010. The women’s team has a poor tournament and fails to win a match however the men score victories over Nepal and Maldives1
Hong Kong hosts the Pepsi ICC World Cricket League Division 3 featuring teams from Denmark, Hong Kong, Italy, Oman, Papua New Guinea and USA. Hong Kong lost its first two matches of the tournament but won its last three games to qualify for the final.014
In January 2014, the Hong Kong team travels to New Zealand to contest the ten-team ICC Cricket World Qualifier 2014. In group matches, Hong Kong beats ODI ranked teams Scotland and Canada and thrashes Nepal by 10 wkts to qualify for the Super Sixes phase of the tournament. A narrow loss by D/L to Kenya in the opening game of the Super Sixes proves costly as despite impressive victories over Namibia and PNG in their remaining Super Sixes matches, Hong Kong cannot improve on their third place and so narrowly miss out on qualifiying for the ICC Cricket World Cup 2015. However by finishing third, Hong Kong gains ODI status in 2014.
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