Baseball5 World Cup: hosting tournament has been great experience for Hong Kong – organiser
More seats were filled in this year’s tournament – won again by Cuba, who beat Japan – than in previous event, says baseball head Dave Ho
The man who brought the Baseball5 World Cup to Hong Kong admits the emerging sport is still in its budding stage locally but insists it has been a great experience hosting the event in the city.
Dave Ho, the chairman of the local baseball association, also believed the six-day tournament, which saw the undefeated Cuba successfully defend their title after defeating Asian champion Japan 2-0 on Saturday, was a “very successful” tournament.
“It was such a rare chance and an honour for us to host this international event, given it isn’t a popular sport in Hong Kong,” he said. “We proved to the world this city is capable of hosting some world-level events.
“The seats at the last World Cup in Mexico were also unfilled, and the World Baseball Softball Confederation was satisfied with us because we had better spectator numbers than in Mexico City.”
Ho expects the overall attendance at Central Harbourfront for the past week to total about “four to five thousand”, of which half were students from invited primary schools.
“We ran roadshows in more than 40 schools over the past few months and had students from no fewer than 25 schools coming over to watch the matches,” he said. “We hoped to take his opportunity to tell the others that baseball5 is growing in Hong Kong, and we are to enter a lot of different communities.
