The Springboks’ last minute loss to the Wallabies in the hosts’ final Tri-Nations encounter on Saturday evening made the Sunday Morning Post‘s sports-pages on Sunday.

With Hong Kong again hosting the final Bledisloe Cup match in October this year (the previous such match took place in 2008) there is renewed interest in the Southern Hemisphere’s premier competition, the Tri-Nations.

In fact, with Hong Kong Bledisloe Cup ticket sales reported to be sluggish this year (in part due to the 2011 Rugby World Cup in New Zealand next year) the Hong Kong rugby authorities are pinning their hopes on the Wallabies beating their Trans-Tasman opponents in next week’s final Tri-Nations encounter.  This, they hope, would make the third-ever Bledisloe Cup to be played on neutral ground more of a contest with the All Blacks having totally dominated the Tri-Nations this year.

With a potential Hong Kong bid for the 2023 Asian Games looming, it is not hard to understand why the issue of white elephants will be in the back of locals’ minds.

The following story about South Africa’s World Cup stadia and the fact that they are not suitable for cricket appeared in today’s Sunday Morning Post.

The story highlights comments by SARU President, Oregan Hoskins:

“What we are discussing today should have been discussed before we built the stadiums.  It is tragic we have to act in reverse.”

After winning his first Major golf tournament at St. Andrews on Sunday, Mosselbaai-native Louis Oosthuizen must have been hounded by the media non-stop.

Here in Hong Kong he made the sports section of the free daily newspaper The Standard on Tuesday (July 20,2010).

I’m not sure where the headline “Ooh-la-la he’s cool” fits in but after the successes of the 2010 World Cup, Louis did his bit to keep South Africa’s name in the hearts and minds of the world.

Cheers Louis.

(click on the newspaper page above for larger view)

The South China Morning Post‘s PostMagazine of June 27, 2010 carried a story by one Daniel Jeffreys in their regular “Toast rack” feature.

Before I continue, let me come clean by saying that said writer and I share at least one belief and that is:

(Jeffreys wrote) “Democracy and free speech go hand in hand but there has to be a limit.”

Those who know me will know that I also advocate that “too much democracy is not a good thing.”

Anyway, where Mr Jeffreys and I differ is his obvious disdain for our vuvuzela.

To the rant below, all we can say is:

Dear Mr Daniel Jeffreys (who is obviously a sour-puss England football fan) where is your “Gees” ?

(Click on the pic below to read full screen)

Here at Howzit-HongKong.com we make it our business to stay abreast of what’s going on in our fair city.  For this reason, we read a plethora of magazines and daily papers to stay abreast of things.

One of these magazines is Time Out Hong Kong. 

Although not free (you can buy it every fortnight at HK$18) Time Out Hong Kong is an excellent source of information on Hong Kong’s vibrant social life and it’s thousands of restaurants, bars and other interesting places/events to visit and hang out at.

As we are all in the spirit of the 2010 Football World Cup, Time Out Hong Kong refused to be left behind and has a interesting featuring in this week’s edition.  They have ”scoured the city” and found one local resident who hails from each of the 32 participating World Cup countries.

The South African representative and long-time Hong Konger is none other but Gary Kitching.

This is what Gary had to say:

“It is an immensely proud moment to be South African and African.  The negative commentary has made us even more determined to host the best World Cup ever.”

Well said Gary.  We love that you’re representing in a Springbok jersey!

(Gary is the MD and a partner of Grebstad Hicks Communications)

The 2010 World Cup feature that appears in the current edition of Time Out Hong Kong:

If you’ve taken careful notice, you will have seen our section called “SA in the HK Media.”

With the 2010 World Cup a mere 5 days away, it’s getting more and more of a chore keeping up with all the reports from home appearing in the Hog Kong media.  That is NOT at all a bad thing.

We hope you didn’t miss last Friday’s edition of HK Magazine for they had a lekker insert about the World Cup called “HK World Cup Guide 2010.”

A useful local guide to the world’s biggest sporting event, it features sections like:

* A guide to the BIG TEAMS: Argentina, Brazil, England, France, Germany, Italy, Portugal and Spain.

* The COMEBACK KIDS: Australia, Chile, Greece, Mexico, Uruguay, Ivory Coast, Ghana, Serbia, North Korea, Slovakia and Slovenia.

* The ONES TO WATCH: Cameroon, Denmark, Honduras, South Korea, Netherlands, Paraguay, South Africa and USA.

* The UNDERDOGS: Algeria, Japan, New Zealand, Nigeria and Switzerland.

The insert also features a handy guide to where you can sample some of the participating nations’ cuisine in Hong Kong while watching the on-the-pitch action from South Africa.

Needless to say there’s also a handy Match Schedule as well as a sheet where you can enter the scores and progress of the teams as the tournament progresses.

If all else fails and you did in fact miss last week’s issue of the HK Magazine, just contact them, hopefully they still have a few copies left over.

Find the HK magazine here:

Asia City Publishing Ltd.

301 Hollywood Centre

233 Hollywood Road, Hong Kong

Tel. (+852) 2850-5065

Fax. (+852) 2543-1880

E-mail: asiacity@asia-city.com.hk

Hurry.

Here at Howzit-HongKong.com we do a lot to draw our readers’ attention to the 2010 Soccer World Cup.  So seeing the local English daily South China Morning Post feature the World Cup in it’s Sunday Morning Post edition (30 May 2010) comes as a welcome bonus.

The newspaper’s page 4-5 spread features key un-biased facts about South Africa such as the economy, main issues (poverty, Aids, crime and energy), weather and sport.  Feature writer Barry Moody also writes about the positive outlook on the tournament while there is also a Reuters story about the iconic Makarapa helmet.

Baie Dankie SCMP!

(You can click on the pictures below to view the stories)

On this website’s homepage, I write of how I often meet fellow-South Africans around Hong Kong and how easy it is to recognise our countrymen and women in this cosmopolitan city.  Funny enough, I probably meet most Saffas in the party-district of Wan Chai.  Regular readers of this Blog will know that I hang out at Delaney’s Irish Bar because we often meet there to watch rugby (they have a satellite dish that picks up Supersport).  Whenever I cover a major Hong Kong sports event, Wan Chai is often where after-work drinks are to be had.

So it was, late one night during the 2009 UBS Hong Kong Golf Open.  A friend and I literally bumped into a Saffa coming out of, shall I say, one of the popular ladies establishments in Lockhard Road.  He recognised us because we were speaking Afrikaans and the connection was immediately made.  The next day I followed that guy for the first couple of rounds at the Fanling golf course where he was playing.

James Kamte is a real stand-up bloke and a good golfer, though not in Hong Kong last year.

Here are some of the pics I took of “The Cobra” on the second hole at the Hong Kong Country Club:

Jason Dasey wrote this article about James Kamte in today’s Sunday Morning Post:

In a week when South Africans all over the world celebrated the 100-day countdown to the kick-off to our biggest sports tournament ever, local celebrations were caught up in a spat between the Hong Kong broadcast-rights holders iCable and the other two broadcasters, ATV and TVB.

In a nutshell, iCable made a successful bid for the broadcast rights to the 2010 FIFA World Cup, while ATV and TVB declined to bid.  iCable then decided that, unlike during the two previous World Cups, they will make the TV broadcast available to TVB and ATV, provided they agree to broadcast the entire iCable programme schedule, including advertisements.  TVB and ATB declined and instead wrote to FIFA to try and get clarity on the issue.

At the unveiling ceremony on Wednesday, South African Consul-General Ms Tembi Tambo, however played down the spat instead confirming that the local media tussle “will not mar the spectacle half a world away.” (See The Standard article below)

The countdown ceremony at Hong Kong’s Times Square on Wednesday, organised by iCable was not reported on by TVB’s English language Pearl TV during any on their news broadcasts on the evening of the unveiling.  Howzit-HongKong.com however, was not able to monitor ATV’s coverage on the evening.

At Times Square on Wednesday, hoards of media with their cameras were to be seen, but like we’ve seen (and reported on) at the Invictus premiere, one cannot say whether they were there for the celebrations or for the opportunity to interview the iCable head honcho about the current 2010 media spat.

Thankfully, as we reported in several posts after the countdown ceremony, the local English print media and in particular the South China Morning Post (SCMP) did a great job on covering this momentous occasion.  We noticed that SCMP’s sports reporter Alvin Sallay had another in-deep discussion with Mark Fish in this morning’s Sunday Morning Post (more about that tomorrow).   Here’s how the local English-language daily, The Standard reported on Wednesday’s countdown-clock event:

Although only about a week old, SA 2010 Ambassador Mark Fish’s baby daughter is already making ripples on the other side of the world.

On the day that we were supposed to attend a media conference with South African 2010 Ambassador Mark Fish, the Hong Kong media was alerted that the press conference was cancelled due to the birth of Fish’s baby-daughter.

As I’ve mentioned before, there are two things dear to the Chinese heart: one is their food with the other being their kids; and not always in that order.  The latter showed during the unveiling of the 2010 countdown clock.  The MC started his questions (see video) to the former Bafana Bafana (SA soccer team) player with a question about his baby.  I also heard two other reporters start their questions with the same issue. 

The local English daily’s sports reporter Alvin Sallay, though of Sri Lankan descent, was not left out and he filed the following story in the South China Morning Post the following day: 

(click on the pics to open larger image)