Hong Kong Soccer Sevens Returns May 26-28 with EPL Clubs After Four Years

Hong Kong Citi Soccer Sevens will return for a three-day football competition from May 26 to 28, featuring Premier League clubs Brighton & Hove Albion, Leicester City, Newcastle, and Hong Kong’s Kitchee and HKU23.

The HKFC Citi Soccer Sevens is an annual invitational soccer tournament organised by Hong Kong Football Club, featuring two competitions, the Main tournament and Masters tournament. It was cancelled in 2020, 2021, and 2022 due to the COVID-19 pandemic.

The 16-team Main tournament is open age group and features mostly academy teams from European clubs pitted against senior players from Asia’s leagues.

The 10-team Masters Tournament is for players aged 35 and over and features former players from Europe's top leagues.

“This is actually the fourth decade the Soccer Sevens is being held over here. It is an incredible achievement. We still have the professional teams. It is massive for their calendar, an iconic tournament,” Neil Jensen, HKFC chairman, told the SCMP.

“We are just delighted we can still do this, and I hope that in 20 years’ time, we are still having this conversation about the Soccer Sevens coming up.”

Hong Kong Soccer Sevens’ chairman Tony Bratsanos also said to the SCMP, “Hong Kong needs sport, it really does. It is a football-mad city, and we are going to bring out some of the best teams in Europe.”

“To get these teams to come out from Europe they have to trust the organisation, they have to trust the way we organise the tournament.”

History of the Hong Kong Soccer Sevens

The competition was founded in 1999, with current champions of the 2019 Hong Kong Soccer Sevens competition as Newcastle United.

Aston Villa are the most successful club in the tournament’s history, winning six titles over twenty years.

The tournament has hosted many young professional players from the Premier League, including Jack Grealish, Anton Ferdinand, David Bentley, Marc Albrighton, Emile Heskey, Wojciech Szczesny, John Arne Risse, Matt Le Tissier, and John Barne.

Differing with two set 45-minute halves in official football games, each game at the Soccer Sevens has two seven-minute halves with a one-minute half-time break, while the finals are 10 minutes each half with a three-minute break at half-time.