Referees from the HKRU’s National Referee Development Program (NRDP), Evans Lam, Jackie Ho and Rory Crombie were selected for the London Exchange, now into its third year. This tour provides community referees - who have the desire and potential to reach the high performance level - with the opportunity to develop in a new and challenging environment.

During the ten day tour, the referees participated in the prestigious Rosslyn Park National School Sevens (NSS) – the largest school Sevens tournament in the world. With over 7000 players involved over five days and around fifty matches for our referees, this presented a great opportunity to be involved in some high quality rugby games and gain fantastic experience and feedback from some of the RFU’s top referee coaches.

This trip gives HKRU’s referees the chance to referee not only the shorter form of the game but also some Senior League 15s and U18 Colts. The high standard of their refereeing was praised by the referee coaches and also acknowledged by the teams they refereed.

“It’s great to see our next generation of referees doing well here in Hong Kong, which then gives them opportunities such as travelling overseas on development tours”, said HKRU Community Referee Manager Matt Rodden. “They put in a huge amount of work as part of the NRDP and selection for London is just reward. We have been pleased with the improvements they have made and look forward to seeing new referees challenging them in the near future”.

Want to get involved?

The London Exchange is just one of the many opportunities available for development referees in Hong Kong. If you would like to participate or to know more about refereeing, please contact the HKRU Referee Department - [email protected].