HK sport bodies resist lure of Games
NEXT year's Commonwealth Games, the last Hong Kong will be eligible to compete in before the territory reverts to China in 1997, has failed to capture the imagination of the local sporting bodies with only eight sports entered so far for Victoria, Canada.
This is almost half the number of sports the national bodies want to send to the Asian Games in Hiroshima, Japan.
The Amateur Sports Federation and Olympic Committee (ASF & OC), has received 15 entries for the Hiroshima Games including two team sports - soccer and water polo.
The ASF & OC has set December 15 as the dead-line for sports entries for both multi-national events.
The national sports bodies from swimming (including diving and water polo) athletics, badminton, tenpin bowling, canoeing, cycling, fencing, soccer, gymnastics, judo, rowing, shooting, table tennis, wushu and yachting (including windsurfing) want to compete in Hiroshima.
But only sporting bodies from athletics, badminton, lawn bowls, handicapped lawn bowls, cycling, gymnastics, shooting and swimming (including diving) have given indications that they want to compete in Victoria so far.
Hong Kong's best hopes of a gold medal in Hiroshima rest in windsurfing where the territory can boast of having a world, European and Asian champion in female windsurfer Lee Lai-shan.
The territory should also figure prominently in table tennis, tenpin bowling, rowing and shooting.
In the Commonwealth Games, Hong Kong will be pinning their medal hopes on lawn bowls. Top bowler, Mark McMahon, won a silver in the last Commonwealth Games in Auckland in 1990.
