A week after a 27-3 loss to South Korea, more had been expected of the visitors, but Malaysia never really threatened their hosts and the only points came when Hong Kong were penalised for infringing at the breakdown.

The only blot on the evening for Hong Kong was the red card shown to full-back Paul Altier, who dived into a ruck connecting with the head of Malaysia skipper Fairuz Ab Rahman with little more than an hour played.

Altier had earlier spent 10 minutes in the sin-bin in the first half having been penalised for a deliberate knock-on, denying Malaysia their only real shot at a try, which came after a rare break from wing Adam Ariff Alias.

Not that his absence mattered, already 24-6 up when Altier committed his first offence, McNeish and Higson-Smith grabbed their scores, adding to the ones Lauder, Brien and van der Smit had already managed.

Brien added two more either side of half-time, with his third sending his side past 50 points and the Sevens star said he had been “lucky to be on the end of” his five tries.

“We stuck to our game plan the whole way through,” Brien said. “Sometimes when you get into games like that people tend to go off script, but it was pretty good performance from everyone and to just keep building that momentum into next week.”

While Brien will take much of the plaudits, his Sevens teammates also showed how much they bring to the side, with Callum McCullough in particular enjoying an impressive game in the forwards alongside the ever reliable Patrick Jenkinson.

The vice-captain rarely has a bad day for Hong Kong, and his work at the line-out and in the loose did as much to disrupt the opposition as anything.

“We knew Malaysia would come out with a lot of intent, a lot of energy, but we managed to control that really well and took our chances,” Evans said. “It was a really positive performance and I’m happy with the result.”