執柒佢啦
2024-09-26 20:44:52
Hong Kong football team’s beach bar night out was a ‘bonding experience’, coach says
Ashley Westwood said he arranged a night out drinking for Hong Kong’s footballers in Fiji to strengthen team spirit and “create a good environment”, although at least one club manager was not pleased when his players reported back for duty a little worse for wear.
Having drawn 1-1 with Fiji to win the tri-nations tournament earlier this month, which followed a 3-0 victory over the Solomon Islands three days earlier, a number of players and staff headed from the team hotel to a beach bar in Nadi.
Westwood, who was named head coach last month, organised a coach to transport the team and staff to and from the bar for what he called “a controlled” event. The Football Association of Hong Kong China described the outing as a “light-hearted occasion with minimum drinking involved”.
But several people raised concerns during and after the occasion, and video footage of the journey back to the team hotel, which the Post has seen, paints a very different picture to the official line.
Nearly three years after 11 under-23 squad members were heavily punished for reportedly vandalising hotel rooms following a game in Japan, the issue of Hong Kong players drinking on international duty remains a sensitive one.
Four of the Hong Kong players in Fiji, Tse Ka-wing, Lam Hin-ting, Max Poon Pui-hin and Shinichi Chan, were among those who received one-year bans from representing Hong Kong for their parts in the October 2021 incident.
“I am a big believer that it’s best to arrange something where it will be controlled and there will be no trouble, because I will be there,” Westwood told the Post. “If anyone thinks that some players are not going to have a drink for 12 months, they are deluded.
“I ask my players to work as hard as possible from the minute they get to a camp to the final game. After the last game, I like everybody getting together and having a meal, and you can have a few drinks with me.
“No one’s being sick, or bringing girls home, or doing anything stupid.
“I know how to create team spirit. When you are new, to sit in an environment out of the hotel, and go around the lads when they’re relaxed, creates a good environment. It’s not 20 drinks, it’s one or two; four or five maximum.”
But Westwood acknowledged the government funding the HKFA receives and said he was well aware that “if somebody steps out of line, or if something goes wrong, we’ll probably lose that funding”.
A spokeswoman for the HKFA said the governing body knew about the “team bonding” and were glad Westwood “had the opportunity to spend time with the players and the team in Fiji”.
“I know when I ask these players to run hard, this experience will be in the back of their minds,” Westwood said. “They’ll think, ‘this coach let us do that, so I will run harder for him’.
“Or, if I have a disagreement with someone and have to deliver a stern word, they’ll remember I’m an OK person, because I’ve done things like that for them. If they give me everything, I’ll give them something back.”
Westwood was in charge of the Afghanistan national team for 10 months, before being chosen from more than 200 candidates to succeed Jorn Andersen in the Hong Kong post.
A former Manchester United trainee, he previously managed in India with Bengaluru, where he won two I-League titles, and RoundGlass Punjab, and at Penang in Malaysia.
A player who played for Westwood at club level said the Englishman created an “incredibly professional environment”. Team bonding was instrumental to Westwood’s leadership, said the player, but that did not involve drinking at his club.
執柒佢啦
2024-09-26 20:45:05
The Hong Kong Premier League manager, who did not want to be named, said he was not happy about the night out, given the domestic season was already under way at that point.
Westwood said the Fiji night out was “not compulsory”, and the Post has been told some players opted to stay at their hotel. “Four or five who came didn’t have a drink,” Westwood said.
The 48-year-old said there would “definitely” be more team building activities, but they would “not always operate around drink”. The next three international camps finish in Hong Kong and Westwood acknowledged the city “might not be the right [setting] for [going to bars]”.
“It might be that we just go for a meal,” said Westwood, who took his Afghanistan squad to a snooker hall, while there was a cinema trip for Bengaluru’s players. “Sometimes, things come to you and you think, ‘let’s do that with the lads to give them an afternoon off’.”
https://www.scmp.com/sport/football/article/3280007/hong-kong-football-teams-beach-bar-night-out-bonding-experience-coach-westwood-says