From Strasbourg to Hong Kong: Gilles Meyer's Unpretentious Journey

By KH - HK Kickers
30 April 2026

On a sunny afternoon in April, we had a lively chat with Frenchman Gilles Meyer, former goalkeeper and the current assistant coach of the Hong Kong Football Club in the Premier League. Visiting the HKFC Stadium is nothing special for a local football fan, but wandering through the Clubhouse with Gilles is definitely a more peculiar experience.

“I was born in Strasbourg, and I grew up in the village near Strasbourg.” Gilles grew up in the northeastern French city bordering Germany. “My father was the President of a local club, so I started playing football like that. I started playing football when I was maybe 5, 6 years old. Quickly, I started to become a goalkeeper because I didn't like running!

Gilles enjoyed football at the local club, As Erstein, and his first big opportunity came when he was 11 years old. Racing Club de Strasbourg, a big club in his home region and now owned by BlueCo (a consortium led by Todd Boehly that also owns Chelsea FC), recruited him to their academy. “I spent five, six seasons there until 17 years old. I didn't start playing professionally there. After that, I started playing senior football from League Five to League Four in France.”

By the time Gilles started playing senior football, Championnat de France Amateur (CFA), or League Four, as Gilles mentioned, was the top level of semiprofessional football in France. It is now known as Championnat National 2. “We trained every day. We went to games on the weekend. We would travel 6, 7, 8 hours by bus to play a game. When I was in France. Football is everything for me. It was my job there in France.”

Gilles spent his career in the lower leagues of France until 2015, when he broke his Achilles. “My wife and I really wanted to have a new experience overseas, and I had some contacts with overseas clubs, but because I broke my Achilles, the contacts closed.” 

It took one year for Gilles to recover from his severe injury, and when he returned, the road back to senior football proved as difficult as the rehab itself. “The coaches and the clubs started to look at me [and said], ‘Oh, are you sure you can play?’ Well, come on, I worked so hard for one year to come back. I was training, doing six months with the reserve team of RC Strasbourg. I felt okay. I started to play some friendly games, so I really didn't like that.”

In 2017, Gilles’ wife got an opportunity to work in Hong Kong, and he decided to follow her and relocate there. “I arrived in February 2017, and I didn't know anyone here. I started to email some companies if I could coach part-time, and I had some contact with professional clubs.” One of the first to reply was the Asia Pacific Soccer School, which subsequently employed Gilles as a coach. 

He also spent four months training with Lee Man Rangers. “It was great, I started to get to know some people, and develop my network here. During the summer of 2017, I quickly understood that being a foreign goalkeeper in Hong Kong is difficult.” Therefore, Gilles decided to play part-time in Division One of the city and to be a full-time coach. 

Gilles’ first club in Division One was Mutual Sparta. After a good season, he joined Wing Yee and stayed there for four seasons. “It was like my second family. We were four foreigners in the team, and the rest were local players, but they were amazing with us. Both the coaches were the top guys and still have some contact with them.” At the same time, the French goalkeeper started coaching in the Hong Kong Football Club. He first coached their under-18s in the Youth Premier League until COVID arrived.

Gilles’ son was born during the pandemic, “and after a year and a half, no one in the family was able to meet him. We [couldn’t see] when the city would open again, so I said to my wife that I would take the decision to go back to France and let's see.”

It was about six months after his homecoming to France that Hong Kong reopened to the World. “We were not happy; we came back exactly where we were before. [It felt like it was] just a big step back.” Soon after the family returned to Hong Kong in 2023, the Football Club wanted Gilles as a youth coach and as a first-team player for their Premier League campaign.

“We had a good season in the Premier League,” the Football Club finished seventh in the 11-club 2023-24 Season, their best top-flight finish in decades. “At the end of the season, I was losing motivation to play, to be honest. So when the club asked me, ‘A lot of changes will happen to the first team. Do you want to be the second assistant coach?’ I said yeah, I thought it was the moment to stop my career and join as an assistant coach in the first team.”

The Frenchman was coaching the under-18s of Lucky Mile last year; the so-called “B-team” of HKFC qualified in the Youth Premier League Championship Group and won 3rd place in the FA Cup. “William Mirwasser was playing for me. It was not only him, but all the boys were also amazing. They played the style of football I love to see. A lot of them are playing in under-22s with me now.”

This season, Gilles assumes a more significant role in the first team as an assistant coach supporting head coach Chancy Cooke. He was responsible for many of the pre-season signings for the Football Club. “We started to work during the pre-season to find some players. I scouted Tatsuya [Inoue] in Mongolia. I found him on Transfermarkt and contacted him on Instagram. I was the first to do it after a call with the coach. I found his video on YouTube. Enzo [Dietrich] did reach the same.” Dietrich is also a former player in the Mongolian Premier League. “We need to target this kind of profile because our budget is not high.”

When asked about the difference between football in France and football in HK, Gilles gave a multilayered answer. 

“In France, football is equal at school. When I went back to France in 2022-2023, I was coaching a U17 team - we had three training sessions a week in France. I never heard a boy say, ‘I cannot come because I have exams’. They found their own balance. They came to training because they wanted to, and they expected to be professional as well. When I was in Strasbourg, my school was inside the academy. The schedule was school, training, school, training.”

In Gilles’ opinion, the aggression and the intensity of French football are undoubtedly much higher. “It’s not only the game, but also the training as well, because we fight for our place, and we play to win, we don't play to play. We play to win. It's a competition. When we step on the pitch, you see.”

The attitude to fight for survival is something that lacks in Hong Kong, he believes. “When you smell the grass, when it's raining, you walk with the studs, it is like you go to war … I know the weather is difficult to play here, you have to be honest, but sometimes I think the intensity, even in training, is low.” 

“For me, you play as you train. If the intensity is not high during training, we cannot expect to play with high intensity during the game. I don't blame the players, but it's for everyone. I think that is a big issue.”

The differences in mindsets between foreigners and locals have been apparent to a foreign player like Gilles. “Sometimes, especially maybe the local players, they don't have that [mentality]. The system protects them because every team needs local players, so you can see some players move to another club every season. They're guaranteed to find a team. While I sometimes see foreigners here, they give their all in training, and the locals are not able to follow. I can see frustration sometimes.” 

“When I see North District, all the Brazilians are flying on the pitch and fighting because football is everything for them. Because they come here to fight, probably for a better contract from another team, because they need to feed their family. Football is everything for them, and they know they don't perform well. Maybe they don't have a club next season.”

“Why are the foreigners better than the locals? There's something behind. Sometimes the feeling of the locals is that they know next season they will find a club, because all clubs need local players, especially now with the under-22 teams, even more and more [playing opportunities]. I don't blame them, but the system is like that.”

Gilles enjoys coaching both foreigners and locals at his club. “For sure, because I'm a foreigner, I have an easier relationship with foreigners, but my relationship with locals is good as well. I think so. I hope so! (laughter)”

“[Sometimes] I don't understand what they say, but, same, I just like to be honest with all of them. If I'm not satisfied with one player, I will tell him; if I'm satisfied, I will tell him as well.” The honesty continues even amid the current streak of bad results, “we have to be honest. Now I would say we have to be behind them mentally because we don't want to give up. I don't want to give up because this season is not finished.”

“Now we have to try to enjoy training, because training is a routine. If they don't have fun during the week, I don't know how they can approach the game during the weekend.” 

Gilles, like many, is critical of the pitch quality for league games. “For the Premier League, we should play on better pitches sometimes, because the quality of the grass is not the same everywhere. When I see Tseung Kwan O and Tsing Yi, there's a big gap [in pitch quality]. I think the FA needs to improve that.” 

“When you go to Tseung Kwan O, the smell of the grass there, that is football. When you go to Tsing Yi, no, it's like going to the park. It's not much about football. Sham Shui Po is the same. I think Mong Kok Stadium is a really good football stadium, but they could improve the grass a little bit as well.”

“Here [in HKFC] is a good stadium, it's really like an English stadium. But I think we cannot change [the pitch] because we have so many teams trying to train and play every day. If it's not football, it's rugby. If you can change the pitch every two years, it’s not too bad.”

What appears to be a bigger concern to him is the unusual implementation of VAR this season. “We either have VAR for all games, or we don't have a VAR at all. But we just have VAR for some games. It doesn't work.” 

“It's not fair because maybe in one game, VAR could punish us; in a game after, because there was no VAR, we didn't get the penalty. For me, that is not fair. So, either VAR for every game or we stop VAR. Save money if you don't have enough money to cover all the games, because it's not fair for all teams.”

From these straightforward comments, it is not surprising to hear him describing his coaching style similarly. “I bring to my trainings what I learned in Europe: respect, be on time, respect your teammates, and respect your coach. That's the first thing. We don't talk about football.”

“The second thing, you are here to work. If you step on the pitch, you need to give everything. It's not just coming to touch the ball. You bring the best intensity to training.” Intensity is not only about running, he said, “it's also about can you understand quickly? Can you make a quick decision? Can you make the good parts a good moment? That's mental intensity as well. [There’s also] technical intensity. Can you make the good skill a good moment?”

“I always say to them, I will never blame you if you give everything on the pitch, and you can make mistakes, that's okay. I made mistakes when I was a player; it's fine. But give everything okay? Because you can have a bad day. You can miss your touch, your controls, your passes, a 1v1, but running is what you can do.”

“After that, I like to be aggressive on the pitch, I like to press.” The intensive playing style is visible in both the first team under Chancy and the under-22 team led by Gilles, “but I can also be pragmatic to deal with the opposition’s strengths and weaknesses.” 

“But before tactics, it’s what I said to you: Attitude. Mindset. Fight. Fight for you. Fight for me. Fight for your teammates.” 

“I am not saying I'm the best coach. I don't say that, but I know when my boys step on the pitch, they will fight until the last second - it's something I can guarantee. If they can't give me that, they can't play." 

His under-22 team did not have to fight until the last second, though, as they secured the HKPL U-22 League champions before playing their final game. It is certainly one of the best achievements in the Frenchman’s coaching career, and another sign of the Football Club’s ambition to develop future talents.

Profile:
Gilles Meyer
DOB: 1987-12-09
Nationality: France
Playing position: GK
Current Job: HKFC (Assistant Coach, Under-22s & Under-16s Head Coach)
UEFA A License holder