China News Service, Nagoya, Japan, October 3. Title: Exclusive interview with the head of the Hong Kong delegation: Hong Kong and mainland athletes have a profound friendship both inside and outside the competition field.
Reporters Guoxuan Xu Pengpeng
On September 28, at the table tennis women's doubles awards ceremony at the Aichi Nagoya Asian Games, the champions, Chinese combination Wang Manyu/Kui Man, invited the bronze medal-winning combination of Hong Kong, China Du Kaiqin/Ng Yonglin to stand on the highest podium for a group photo. This heartwarming scene attracted many likes from netizens on social media.
In an exclusive interview with a reporter from China News Service, Huang Baoji, head of the Hong Kong delegation at this Asian Games, also liked the photo and said that he was deeply touched by the heartwarming comments from netizens.
"Athletes from Hong Kong and Mainland China are brothers and sisters. Not only in table tennis, as long as they are on the podium together, they will basically celebrate and take photos together after the game." Huang Baoji said.
Similar warmth also appeared in other venues of this Asian Games. The men's tennis men's singles final was staged as the "Chinese Derby". Huang Zelin of the Hong Kong team and Wu Yibing of the Chinese team both wore red jerseys and eventually won the championship and runner-up respectively. The anthem of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao National Games, which was successfully held last year, "Momentum Like a Rainbow" was played live. At the award ceremony, the national anthem was played and the entire Chinese audience sang together.
The friendship on the field stems from long-term mutual understanding and companionship.
As early as the welcome ceremony before the opening of this Asian Games, the three delegations from China, Hong Kong, China, and Macau, China took a group photo on the same stage. Huang Baoji said that the three teams have been competing all over the world all year round and are very familiar with each other.
"In addition to comprehensive sports games, in individual events, Hong Kong and mainland athletes compete in international competitions all year round. It is normal to eat and chat together. Especially during the holidays, when everyone is in a foreign country, they help each other and have a deep friendship."
This kind of tacit understanding inside and outside the stadium is inseparable from the increasingly close sports exchanges and cooperation between Hong Kong and the mainland.
Huang Baoji introduced that in recent years, many Hong Kong elite athletes have gone to the mainland to train with the national team every year, and mainland athletes and coaches have also come to Hong Kong for exchanges. The two sides have long-term cooperation in athlete training, coach exchanges, referee exchanges, sports industry cooperation and international affairs coordination, etc., providing strong support for Hong Kong athletes to improve their competitive levels.
"Many of our sports teams use the resources of the mainland to develop, such as gymnastics, swimming, ball sports and other sports." Huang Baoji said that he hopes that with the support of the SAR government, Hong Kong and other cities in the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area will further strengthen sports cooperation, expand resources in terms of venues, funds, etc., hold more competitions and training activities, and drive the continuous improvement of competitive sports levels.
In September this year, the "First Five-Year Plan for the Economic and Social Development of the Hong Kong Special Administrative Region (2026-2030)" and the "Chief Executive's 2026 Policy Address" were officially announced, making arrangements to promote the popularization, elitism, event-oriented, professional and industrial development of sports, and proposed to deepen the construction of the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao Greater Bay Area and build a global cooperation network.
In his view, the Guangdong-Hong Kong-Macao National Games successfully held last year provided a vivid case for deepening the integrated development of the Greater Bay Area. Huang Baoji believes that Hong Kong and the mainland have a long history of sports exchanges and a profound foundation for cooperation. There is still broad room for cooperation in the future in terms of athlete training, event hosting and sports industry.
While exchanges and cooperation continue to deepen, Hong Kong competitive sports are also developing in a more diversified direction. The performance of the Hong Kong delegation in this Asian Games is a microcosm. The total number of people in the delegation exceeds 800, including about 580 athletes participating in 38 events. As of 20:00 on October 3, the Hong Kong team has won 11 golds, 19 silvers and 23 bronzes, a total of 53 medals, setting a new record for the number of gold medals in a single Asian Games.
"We exceeded the expectations before the competition." Huang Baoji said that the Hong Kong team not only won gold and silver in traditional advantageous sports such as martial arts, swimming, sailing, squash and fencing, but also sent athletes for the first time to participate in modern pentathlon, wrestling, paddle tennis and rhythmic gymnastics, showing the diversified development trend of Hong Kong sports.
During the Asian Games, Huang Baoji shuttled to different venues every day, paying attention to every breakthrough of Hong Kong athletes. Talking about the achievements of this event, he knows them all: the men's rugby sevens successfully defended the title and achieved a historic three consecutive Asian Games titles; the squash mixed doubles event won the gold and silver medals for the first time; the martial arts Sanda event won 1 silver and 1 bronze, achieving a "zero breakthrough" in Asian Games medals; the men's karate team event won a historic bronze; the men's track cycling team sprint event won the bronze medal for the first time...
Behind these breakthroughs are not only the efforts of the athletes and coaching teams, but also the long-term investment of Hong Kong Sports in talent training and project development.
Take squash, which performed well in this Asian Games, as an example. As one of the elite sports of the Hong Kong Sports Institute, squash has a deep mass base in Hong Kong. Many community centers have squash courts and offer related courses. Citizens can participate in this sport for free or at a low cost. Some athletes started on community courts and gradually grew into players representing Hong Kong, China in international competitions.
At the same time, Hong Kong hosts a number of international events such as the Hong Kong Squash Open every year, creating opportunities for local players to compete with the world's top players and making Hong Kong an important stop for international squash. With squash being included as an official event in the 2028 Los Angeles Olympic Games, this sport has ushered in new development opportunities in Hong Kong.
In Huang Baoji's view, medals are exciting, but they are not the only purpose of participating in the Asian Games.
"It is not easy for athletes to come to Japan to compete. As long as they can perform at the level of training, it is already great." He said that what is more important than performance is that athletes go all out on the field and show a fighting and progressive spirit.
This Asian Games is coming to an end, and the athletes of the Hong Kong, China team are about to start a new journey.
"The Asian Games is the 'mid-term test' in the Olympic preparation cycle. After the end, the Los Angeles Olympic points competition for each event will begin." Huang Baoji said, "The athletes participating in the Olympic events this time performed well. I have great confidence in them."
