Hong Kong looking to regroup after Kenya A punish ‘rustiness and inaccuracies’
Despite a torrential downpour delaying the start of play and his side succumbing 24-18, Hong Kong coach Leigh Jones was quick to look for positives after Tuesday night’s friendly against Kenya A in Nairobi.
Despite a torrential downpour delaying the start of play and his side succumbing 24-18, Hong Kong coach Leigh Jones was quick to look for positives after Tuesday night’s friendly against Kenya A in Nairobi.
Jones admitted to seeing some rust in his charges, but was pleased with many aspects of the game.
“We controlled the first half,” he said. “We created two or three chances but didn’t finish them off. Liam Owens came on at fly-half and played very well and young Hugo [Stiles] at fullback showed the class he has.
Now we’ll regroup and look to improve some of our accuracy issues for the test
“The experiment of coming here and looking at guys under test pressure, we got a lot from it.”
Hong Kong started well enough to lead 11-10 at the half – with winger Conor Hartley crossing for Hong Kong – but two breakaway tries early in the second half gave the hosts the ascendancy.
“We looked like a team that hadn’t played together, coming off a summer break with the resulting rustiness and inaccuracies,” Jones said.
“It can be understandable but it isn’t acceptable.”
