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THE Arabian Gulf recorded a historic 16-9 victory over Hong Kong in front of a full house at Bahrain Rugby Football Club on Friday - their first win in six attempts at the Asian Five Nations.
Hong Kong went into the match confident after upsetting Korea, the 2008 runners-up, 32-8 in an impressive display the weekend before last, but instead it was the Gulf who made the early running.
Bahrain-born James Love kicked a penalty and converted scrum-half Jonny MacDonald's try to give them a 10-0 lead.
Hong Kong finally got on the scoreboard with a penalty late in the first half through fly-half Keith Robertson, but Love ensured the hosts still went in with that 10-point cushion with his second penalty.
The Arabian Gulf spent long periods of the second-half on defensive duty, but their line held firm with Love slotting another penalty to increase their lead.
Robertson scored two more penalties for Hong Kong, but the Arabian Gulf were not to be denied as they bounced back from a 43-28 loss in Kazakhstan last week.
Defending champions Japan opened their Asian Five Nations campaign with an emphatic 71-13 win over South Korea on Saturday, highlighted by a remarkable five-try effort from winger Kosuke Endo.
In a classic game of two halves, Japan, Asia's dominant rugby nation, started slow as the Koreans came out with a ferocious intent that saw them push hard early on.
Unfortunately, a weak boot from Korean fly-half Yoon Hee-Soo, who missed two of three kickable penalties in the first-half, prevented them from generating any early momentum.
Despite their sputtering start, Japan did enough to take a 19-3 lead into half-time through tries by hooker Shota Horie, scrum-half Fumiaki Tanaka and winger Endo.
The ever-reliable Ryan Nicholas added two conversions, and finished with eight on the day.
Korea let themselves down through repeated infringements that saw the inevitable sin-binning, this time to scrum-half Park Wan-Yong in the 37th minute and Japan made the most of the resulting man advantage.
They came out firing in the second period with Yasunori Nagatomo scoring in the 41st minute. Takashi Kikutani, Hitoshi Ono and Hiroki Yuhara also crossed over. But Endo stole the show with tries in the 58th, 68th, 71st and 80th minutes.
With their three remaining games in Tokyo, Japan remain on course to be Asia's automatic entry at next year's World Cup where they would be seeded in Pool A alongside hosts New Zealand, France, Tonga and Canada.
A confident Arabian Gulf, however, hope to upset the odds this weekend.
Bahrain Rugby Football Club celebrated the biggest occasion in the club's history with a 'Festival of Rugby' which attracted thousands of supporters.
The event was held under the patronage of General Organisation for Youth and Sports (Goys) president Shaikh Fawaz bin Mohammed Al Khalifa.
Friday night's HSBC Asian Five Nations (A5N) meeting of the Arabian Gulf and Hong Kong formed the centre-piece of the weekend's action.
The game was the first senior Arabian Gulf fixture to take place in Bahrain in eight years and attracted a capacity crowd of around 2,000 spectators.
Bahrain RFC's grounds in Saar underwent a significant transformation with the erection of a temporary 1,600-capacity stand alongside the main pitch.
The pitch itself received some last-minute treatment from Royal Golf Club experts, while new state-of-the-art floodlights and electronic scoreboard stand gleamed proudly along the sidelines.
The Festival of Rugby was very much a two-sided effort. Alongside the occasion of the A5N game a series of special charity events were staged to raise funds for the Teenage Cancer Trust.
Twenty former star international and leading rugby players from the UK flew in to Bahrain to play a Bahrain Legends side organised as a way of saying thank you to the charity helping a St Christopher's School pupil fighting against the disease.
Persia Honar, 14, is currently undergoing treatment at the Royal Hospital for Sick Children in Edinburgh for Ewing's Sarcoma, a rare bone cancer.
Dad Mehdi, the rugby club's vice-chairman, helped organise the charity spectacular.
Kicking off with a dinner and auction at the club on Thursday night, the exhibition rugby match between local and international rugby legends on Saturday afternoon attracted a 500-strong crowd.
The International Legends, boasting more than 400 international caps between them, eventually overcame a spirited Bahrain outfit by 43 points to 31.
The match started with a flurry of tries from the invitational team, including a brace from the over-energetic Irish flanker Richie Woods.
Further scores from former Irish captain Paddy Johns and fellow Irish international James Topping put the visitors into a commanding half-time lead before a strong comeback from the Bahrain side made things interesting.
Local favourite Mehdi Honar led the charge for the hosts in the second period, scoring a try and a beautifully struck conversion in the process.
Man-of-the-match Rob Subbiani joined in the action with a couple of tries of his own before Gary Adriaan brought his side to within a score of their more illustrious opponents.
Another touch-down from Woods eventually put paid to the Bahrain fight-back but not before a serious scare.
In the end it was left to Danielle Love to put the icing on the cake for the international outfit in front of what was another vociferous home support.
"It was a memorable weekend. We had 300-plus guests at the dinner and everybody really enjoyed themselves. Manu and Rena produced an excellent spread of Arabian food to welcome the international guests with a touch of Middle Eastern flavour.
"Kenny Sheil and Cameron Mather were the after-dinner speakers with very entertaining sorties and remarks about rugby and rugby players.
"The international legends also donated lots of memorabilia for an auction. We had more than 20 items and lots of money was raised although we are still in the process of finalising the funds raised to get the actual figure.
"The feedback from everybody has been very positive and all enjoyed the long weekend of rugby and entertainment. It was worthwhile and the entire event did reflect well on Bahrain Rugby Club's committee, management, members and other organisations in the Kingdom of Bahrain.
"Support from everybody was overwhelming. It showed what can be done when a small community gets together for a good cause.
"I would like to say a big thank you to everyone involved for helping me to arrange such a wonderful event in aid of Teenage Cancer Trust and the Sick Kids Hospital appeals."
Dawn Crosby, Teenage Cancer Trust's head of Scotland and Northern Ireland, added: "We are delighted and thank the Bahrain Rugby Club for arranging the charity event. We have just launched a £1.6 million appeal in the East of Scotland and the funds raised will go directly to helping other young people like Medhi's daughter, Persia.
"Every day, six young people are diagnosed with cancer, but we don't believe they should stop being teenagers just because of their diagnosis. The units are designed to be as close as possible to a person's life outside. Most importantly they give young people the very best chance of a positive outcome. We want every young person with cancer to have that chance."
For more information visit www.teeagecancertrust.org/eastofscotlandappeal.
The full programme of events over the weekend included a host of underage exhibition matches and entertainment for all the family.
Bahrain RFC chairman John Sutcliffe said: "We felt that, not only was this a huge event for the rugby club, but it was a big event for the Kingdom of Bahrain as a whole."
With so many delegates from the International Rugby Board, the Asian Rugby Football Union, the Hong Kong Rugby Union and the Arabian Gulf Rugby Football Union coming to Bahrain, the club was determined to put on a great show and put Bahrain RFC on the map as a successful host of an event of this size.
The club is approaching its 40th anniversary and is on the verge of establishing the Bahrain Rugby Football Association through the Goys.
