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May 23, 2015

Japan Men 2015 Asia Rugby Champions

Saturday, 23rd May 2015. It rained on Japan’s parade but Hong Kong did not mind after they finished runners-up to the Asian champions at the inaugural Asia Rugby Championship.

Torrential rain forced the finale at Aberdeen Stadium to be abandoned with the result being declared a draw. It gave Hong Kong three valuable points allowing them to finish on 11 points and pip South Korea (eight points).

Undefeated Japan was crowned champions even before the match started - holding an unbeatable lead with 18 points. They finished with 21 points, but head coach Eddie Jones was less than pleased as he had hoped to finalise his selections for the World Cup after this match.

“We had a number of guys out there playing for World Cup spots and it is quite disappointing in terms of individuals and what the team wanted to achieve,” Jones said.

“It wasn’t dangerous to (continue) play and we said we wanted to play and that is why we went out there and trained [after the abandonment of the match] saying we could continue but by then the decision had been made,” Jones said.

United Arab Emirates referee Chris Linwood called both teams off the pitch 13 minutes into the match with Japan leading 3-0 through a penalty from skipper Ayumu Goromaru as driving rain turned the pitch into a lake.A twenty-minute rain delay was extended by another twenty minutes but the conditions didn’t get any better forcing the eventual abandonment.“It was unsafe and absolutely the right decision for the referee to say “no”,” said Hong Kong head coach Andy Hall. “It would have been a struggle to have a boat out there let alone play rugby.

“The game was important for both teams but it is not worth risking the safety of the players and it was a good decision. The way the conditions were we would have finished second anyway. It wasn’t going to be a game of running rugby and they wouldn’t have got 29 points on us so we would have finished second anyway.

“But it is frustrating. Everyone came to watch rugby but commonsense has to prevail,” Hall added.

Information credits to ARFU

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