Rugby World Cup 2023 qualifiers: Hong Kong playing catch-up after struggling to keep pace with Portugal

Hong Kong’s chances of reaching next year’s Rugby World Cup are far from over, but the reality of the task facing Lewis Evans’ side was put into stark relief by defeat in their opening game of the final qualifying tournament in Dubai.

Manful though it was, the unceasing effort needed during the 42-14 loss at the hands of Portugal never seemed likely to overcome an opposition whose pace and variation of attack was a class apart from what most of the Hong Kong players experience on a weekly basis.

Evans was proud his side “never took a step back”, but acknowledged they had been exposed in “one or two areas” and certainly, top-flight domestic rugby in the city has nothing to compare to the dazzling skills of Portuguese wing Raffaele Storti, who scored two tries, inside centre Tomás Appleton and scrum half Samuel Marques.

And the fact that coach Patrice Lagisquet, who played 46 times for France on the wing, was nicknamed The Bayonne Express, says everything about Portugal’s approach to Sunday’s game.

Marques in particular appeared to delight in keeping Hong Kong’s players off balance and scrambling to cover his jinking runs from the breakdown, and from quick tap penalties.

And while Evans said he had spoken to his side about the threat posed by “one of their wingers”, knowing about Portugal’s “X-factor” and dealing with it are two very different things.

“Unfortunately we couldn’t contain Storti and Marques,” Evans said. “Some of it comes down to some analysis which we did do, and then I think it’s actually following it through at times.”

Hong Kong did not help their own cause: there were golden opportunities to score just before half-time and in the last five minutes that could have made for a much tighter finish, especially if the lapses in concentration that contributed to at least two of Portugal’s six tries had been cut out.