New beak inspires great result against semi-pros

Harrow  1  v  1  Happy Valley 1st team

Scorer: Douglas Tilk

Man of the match: Cianan Whelan ... stood strong in what was a very intense, physical, midfield battle from start to finish ... quality in possession too ... led by example. 

The boys had a gentle start to the day... a late breakfast followed by some local shopping.   We drove in the tour bus to Mong Kok and visited the huge shopping centre 'Langham Place'.   13 floors of shops and restaurants.   Some boys jumped in to the red taxis and looked around the bird market.
Peter Chadwick came back with a canary, 'Xhing Bluey'.   The canary became the team's mascot for our toughest fixture of the tour later in the day.   Our excellent tour guide, Judy, has adopted 'Xhing Bluey'  and will take the bird to her house on an island south of Hong Kong.

At 6pm we kicked off our final tour match against Happy Valley 1st team. A senior team of semi-pros who play in the Hong Kong second division. Happy Valley were physically imposing and were clearly going to be the toughest opposition of the tour. Harrow started brightly and refused to be intimidated; Hamish MacIntyre was causing problems and received several rough challenges for his trouble.  A strong first-half display was capped by an excellent goal from Douglas Tilk. He swivelled on the edge of the box and buried a cracking left-foot finish in the corner of the net. One of the goals of the tour.

Happy Valley stepped up the pressure in the second half and equalised soon after the break. Harrow were a bit slack in defence and to concede so early in the second half was particularly disappointing. However, this team is starting to show real determination and Harrow continued to hold their own. As the match went on Harrow looked the more likely scorers but could not covert.

This was a very pleasing result against tough opposition. The boys were visibly tiring by the end of a very busy tour but had clearly given their all. Very well done on an excellent effort!

 After the match we went for an excellent Chinese meal and celebrated Chester Robinson's 18th birthday. He received a present from our tour guide, Judy, and one from all the boys. The whole restaurant joined in singing "Happy Birthday" as Chester's birthday cakes were brought out.