The Hong Kong Rugby Union (HKRU) is deepening its partnership with Super Rugby side Gallagher Chiefs with the announcement that five Chiefs Development Squad players have arrived in Hong Kong to play in the 2016 Rugbypass.Com Premiership.

Under the trial programme, the five players will play for local clubs for a six-month period and return to the Chiefs setup after the completion of the Premiership season next March.

The exchange, (the first in the three-year partnership that has seen Chiefs players hosted in Hong Kong on an extended basis), is designed to further strengthen the Premiership and, by extension, enhance the readiness of the Hong Kong national team for future Rugby World Cup qualification.

Working in consultation with Hong Kong’s Premiership clubs and The Gallagher Chiefs High Performance Manager Chris Tindel, the Chiefs players have been selected to fit the specific playing needs of some of the Premiership teams.

Dai Rees, General Manager of Rugby Performance at the HKRU, commented on the move saying, “The inclusion of the Chiefs players will further the HKRU efforts to enhance the standard of the Premiership with a long-term objective of enhancing the competitiveness of the national team when it comes to Rugby World Cup qualification and other international competition.

“We have worked closely with the Premiership clubs to identify existing needs in the league competition and also conferred with The Chiefs to ensure that we are bringing in momentum players to help us achieve our long-term goals,” Rees said.

While initially in a trial phase, the placement of players, if proven successful, would be expanded to ensure each club hosts a Chiefs Development player in future seasons.

The incoming players are flanker Josh Dowsing, No.8 Turoa Stephens, lock Lars Morrice, fly-half Nathan De Thierry and centre Joseph Ikenasio.

Dowsing, who captained Samoa at the World Rugby U20 Championship in 2015, has made two appearances with the Development Squad in Hong Kong in 2015 and 2016, while Ikenasio was included in the 2015 travelling squad. The incoming players are all involved in Mitre 10 league level competition in New Zealand.

Two of the five, Dowsing and Morrice, will play for Bloomberg Hong Kong Scottish, who battled insufficient numbers throughout last season’s Premiership. Ikenasio will play with Tigers while Stephens will help shore up the Kowloon scrum and Nathan De Thierry will play for Football Club.

With the majority of the incoming players appearing in the Hong Kong Scottish versus Tigers match that fixture will now serve as the RugbyPass.com Game of the Week, the first domestic league match in Hong Kong history to be live-streamed on the new global rugby portal, RugbyPass.com. That match will kick off at 16.30 at Shek Kip Mei.

All players have been strategically seeded within the Premiership clubs based on their specific positional needs and to ensure that they have no negative impact on the selection or development of Hong Kong qualified national players or the development of local players within the Premiership clubs.

Defending league and Grand Champions Societe Generale Valley and last year’s runners-up in both competitions, Herbert Smith Freehills HKCC, will be in line for players in future should the season-long trial prove successful.

“While Valley and Cricket Club would welcome the opportunity to host players, at this stage the playing positions within the group of incoming players does not support their placement at these clubs,” Rees noted.

The inclusion of this promising young Kiwi talent will further reinforce the status of the Rugbypass.com Premiership as the top domestic competition in Asia outside of the fully professional Japanese Top League, which has contracted Hong Kong players in the past, including Jamie Hood who is now playing with Ricoh in Tokyo.

It is the first Northern direction move in the partnership after the HKRU has sent its own promising young players to The Chiefs summer development programmes in recent years.

The Chiefs Development Team will also visit Hong Kong for a third straight year next January to engage in an extensive coaching and training exchange with the HKRU and provide training match opportunities for the national team ahead of next season’s Asia Rugby Championships.