Hong Kong improve their World Rugby Rankings, Hong Kong ended their Asia Rugby Championship 2017 campaign with a 39-3 win over Korea at the Hong Kong Football Club Ground on Saturday.
Having beaten the same opposition 43-17 in Incheon a week earlier, the victory ensured Hong Kong of second place behind unbeaten champions Japan with Korea propping up the table with a solitary bonus point to their name.
Both sides struggled in the high humidity and the 34 degree heat, and it was only in the last 20 minutes when Hong Kong found their stride.
For the first hour, they laboured to a 20-3 lead after a score from flanker Nick Hewson, a penalty try and 10 points from the boot of Jamie Hood.
Ben Rimene pushed the margin to 25-3 in the 68th minute when he capped off a skilful passage of handling, before number eight Dan Falvey (main picture) and scrum-half Cado Lee Ka added some gloss to the scoreline.
The win was worth just over three tenths of a rating point, taking Hong Kong to 58.66 points and up to 24th place, above Portugal. Meanwhile, Korea drop one place to 30th with Switzerland the beneficiaries.
Full Rankings
Rankings Explanation
Both Men’s and Women’s World Rugby Rankings are calculated using a ‘Points Exchange’ system, in which sides take points off each other based on the match result. Whatever one side gains, the other loses.
The exchanges are based on the match result, the relative strength of each team, and the margin of victory, and there is an allowance for home advantage.
Points exchanges are doubled during the World Cup Finals to recognise the unique importance of this event, but all other full international matches are treated the same, to be as fair as possible to countries playing a different mix of friendly and competitive matches across the world.
Any match that is not a full international between two member countries does not count at all.
