The Hong Kong Cannons’ home match day was called off less than half an hour before first serve. MLP Asia says the agency it relied on never processed the visiting players’ work visas, and that the agency’s staff altered the records to hide it.
MLP Asia’s second night was supposed to be its biggest. The Hong Kong Cannons were to play in front of their own crowd for the first time, against the Viet Panthers and then the Dragon Warriors, at Discovery Bay Recreation Club on Saturday afternoon. The league’s own preview called it the strongest match day of the regular season. Instead, with less than half an hour to go before the scheduled 2pm start, the league published a statement saying it was off.
The reason is not one anybody will have planned for. Light Years Production was the visa agency the league relied on to secure work visas for “all visiting athletes and staff”. “Hours before the start of the event,” MLP Asia’s statement says, “we discovered that Light Years Production had failed to process these applications, and that the visa records provided to us had been altered by their staff to conceal this failure.”
The agency does not dispute it. In a signed apology published by the league, Light Years Production blames a mix-up by its staff involving another project, which meant the work visa application for the MLP event “was not processed as required”. It adds that “out of fear of being held accountable, the staff involved altered the previous visa records.” Yeung Ho Wai, who signs as the responsible person, writes: “I take full responsibility for the negligence in oversight, the resulting failure to secure the necessary work visa, and the improper alteration of visa-related documents.”
MLP Asia and the Cannons say they postponed “to ensure full compliance with Hong Kong immigration requirements”. Once they knew, there was no sensible alternative. Ticket holders will get a full refund and can contact the Cannons for help. “Further details on the affected matches will be shared as soon as possible,” the league says.
Three teams, no matches
It is the first postponement in MLP Asia’s history, on only its second match day, and the timing hurts. THE DOTS TOKYO opened the season on Friday with two wins in Ikebukuro and sit on five points from two matches. The Cannons, the Panthers and the Dragon Warriors still have not played, and two of the 12 pool matches are waiting for a date.
Each team plays four times in the pool stage, and the top four of six go to the finals at Tomaz Pickleball Club in Kuala Lumpur on 11 and 12 December. The Cannons now have half of their regular season on hold, the Panthers and the Dragon Warriors a quarter each, and nobody has yet named a new date.
The Cannons lose most. Every team in this league gets one home match day, and this was Hong Kong’s. They play away to the Manila Helios on 20 November and the Malayan Stripes on 28 November. The Dragon Warriors also begin in Manila on 20 November, then host Tokyo and the Panthers on 27 November in Kuala Lumpur. The Panthers, with the draft’s first pick, 15-year-old Tama Shimabukuro, now start at home in Ho Chi Minh City on 21 November against the Stripes and Tokyo.
Tokyo, who could have been overtaken by Saturday night, keep top spot at least until Manila on Friday.
A new league is judged on how it handles its first bad day as much as its first good one. MLP Asia named the problem, published the agency’s own admission and promised refunds, all in one statement. What it has not yet done is find a date for two matches. That is the next test, and Hong Kong’s crowd is still owed a home night.
