AEFE Coupe d’Asie Football Bangkok 2023

The A-Grade boys and Girls flew out to Thailand on Wednesday full of excitement for the first international competition in 3 years. The competitors had flown in from all across Asia and the competition was intense from the start. The 35C heat was definitely challenging for our students, who had acclimatised to the Hong Kong cold, wet, and rainy weather before Easter, but the students took it in their stride and embraced their water breaks between their 20-minute games.

The players started out a bit disoriented with the 7-aside games on smaller pitches and the incessant dynamic play required in the smaller games. However, once they understood the positioning and communicated better with one another, they improved in every game and were actually walking away with scorelines that were surprising to the other teams that had underestimated them at first.

After knocking out both the Bangkok 1 & 2 Home teams, the boys made it to the Cup Final against a very skilled Singaporean team. It was a brilliant game to watch and a few of the players had autographs requested from them by the younger fans. The boys walked away second with their heads held high. The girls did not walk away disappointed either, as they made it to the semi-final in their first-ever competition, and were proud to collect their trophy for 4th place.

Enzo M. was awarded the Golden Glove as the Best Goalkeeper of the match and Maxence F. was nominated for the Golden Boot as the best player. Several of our students; Leny K., Maxence F., Arthur R., and Chiara D. represented the school as Junior Officials, with Leonore F. nominated for the Golden Whistle. We are proud of what the students achieved both on and off the field and imagine the memories will last them for a lifetime.