As you will all be aware, Villa depart Saturday for a “tour” of matches in Hong Kong which, somewhat strangely, will include potentially playing two Premier League teams in Blackburn and Chelsea. The other team in the Asia Trophy tournament is Kitchee, a football club that has operated out of Hong Kong since the early 1930s.

After a solid performance against Walsall in the pre-season friendly on Thursday, Villa will be looking to step up the progress ahead of the season’s opener against Fulham, and this mini-tour will comprise the next step in getting match sharpness.

The tournament, if it can be called that, will comprise two matches for Villa. The first of which will involve a game against Blackburn Rovers, a team we have seen plenty of in recent years with league and cup matches ahoy. Should we win against Blackburn, we would then face the winner of Chelsea vs Kitchee in the final of the competition. Conversely, if we lose against Blackburn, we would face the loser of the aforementioned game.

So who are Kitchee?

There is relatively little to cover regarding two of the teams involved as we already know plenty about the Chelsea and Blackburn teams to make an in depth analysis of their squad. Therefore it makes sense to look at the other team in the tournament, Kitchee.

Kitchee were founded in 1931, and won last year’s Hong Kong First Division title. This was their first title since 1964, where they beat South China to the championship, a team containing former England international Nicky Butt and Serbian striker Mateja Kezman.

Interestingly, their nickname is “Fake Barça”, and the club have been involved with Barcelona for many years as part of Barça’s exploits in maintaining a global brand. Kitchee also have significant Spanish influence in the team nowadays both in playing and managerial appointments.

Kitchee, whilst relatively unknown to most of us in the UK, have managed to beat AC Milan and Juventus in friendly fixtures previously, so we should expect to play a solid team, even if it is most likely that we won’t actually compete against them.

Many people who aren’t experts in the field of football will struggle to recognise any names of the Kitchee squad, with most of the players being Chinese nationals who have not played outside of Asia, along with some Spanish players who have played in European competition.

Kitchee’s Spanish manager Josep Gombau said of the Premier League teams involved in the Asia Trophy “It’ll be wonderful for us to take on these teams. Obviously there’s a big difference in terms of class but we’ll give it our all. We’re very excited for our fans.”

So it could be an opportunity to meet a team that we have never played previously, or it could just be a warm up against the well known teams of Chelsea and Blackburn. Either way, we will play against a team with a manager we haven’t faced before either in the form of Josep Gombau or André Villas-Boas.

How do you think we will get on? Are you interested in the tournament, or do you just see it as another step in warming up for the 2011/2012 season?

UK readers can catch the opening game against Blackburn on Sky Sports on Wednesday July 27th.

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