{"id":445092,"date":"2026-01-29T12:08:12","date_gmt":"2026-01-29T12:08:12","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/445092\/"},"modified":"2026-01-29T12:08:12","modified_gmt":"2026-01-29T12:08:12","slug":"gregor-mcneish-forced-to-retire-in-blow-to-hong-kongs-rugby-world-cup-plans","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/445092\/","title":{"rendered":"Gregor McNeish forced to retire, in blow to Hong Kong\u2019s Rugby World Cup plans"},"content":{"rendered":"<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Hong Kong fly-half Gregor McNeish has been forced to retire through injury, dealing a blow to the city\u2019s preparations for next year\u2019s Rugby World Cup in Australia.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">The 33-year-old, who sealed the 2022 Asian Rugby Championship title with the last kick of a breathtaking game against South Korea, has been battling concussion issues for some time and decided he was unable to carry on.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">McNeish was named in Hong Kong China Rugby\u2019s 35-strong squad of full-time players at the end of 2025, and had been expected to play an important role in the team\u2019s Nations Cup campaign this year.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">Andrew Douglas, HKCR\u2019s head of technical rugby, said McNeish, who was capped 11 times, would be \u201csorely missed\u201d and praised him for his team-first approach.<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">\u201cWhat I love about Gregor is that he always wants to lead, and it takes courage to do that,\u201d Douglas said.<\/p>\n<p><img decoding=\"async\" alt=\"Gregor McNeish makes a break against South Korea in the 2023 Asia Rugby Championships final. Photo: Edmond So\" data-qa=\"BaseImage-handleRenderImage-StyledImage\" class=\"e1gf69pb2 css-6ikqhs e445x7d0\" loading=\"lazy\" src=\"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-content\/uploads\/2026\/01\/d0d9ad1f-3607-4a63-87b0-94946729e7aa_51b8c462.jpg\" title=\"Gregor McNeish makes a break against South Korea in the 2023 Asia Rugby Championships final. Photo: Edmond So\"\/>Gregor McNeish makes a break against South Korea in the 2023 Asia Rugby Championships final. Photo: Edmond So<\/p>\n<p datatype=\"p\" data-qa=\"Component-Component\" class=\"e8zc9q40 css-1c6uqr6 ec74h0k1\">\u201cHe is a champion man, a family man, and could tell a great story. We all looked forward to a Gregor McNeish tale on our bus trips. He served Hong Kong well.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Hong Kong fly-half Gregor McNeish has been forced to retire through injury, dealing a blow to the city\u2019s&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":445093,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[567],"tags":[127126,230933,64,63,2065,28880,157606,10340,108862,230934,145827,1736,760,15131,5994,5813,2020,85],"class_list":["post-445092","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-rugby","tag-andrew-douglas","tag-asian-rugby-championship","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-canada","tag-concussion-issues","tag-gregor-mcneish","tag-hong-kong","tag-hong-kong-china-rugby","tag-hong-kong-scottish","tag-nations-cup","tag-new-zealand","tag-rugby","tag-rugby-world-cup","tag-scotland","tag-south-korea","tag-spain","tag-sports"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/445092","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=445092"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/445092\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/445093"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=445092"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=445092"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=445092"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}