CHINA TENNIS - Key Persons
Biography
Dr. Kelvin Inge is the only Hong Kong player to have reached the No. 1 in the ITF junior world rankings, a feat that he achieved in 1981. He was the first player from Hong Kong to compete at Junior Wimbledon and did so from 1979-1981. In 1980, he was also the first player from Hong Kong to compete in the US Open boys' singles.
In 1981, he won the under-18 boys' doubles title at the Asian Junior Championships. He captured the Head Junior Invitational Championships in Kuala Lumpur, Head Thailand International Junior Championships in Bangkok, and both singles and doubles at the ITF Hong Kong Invitational Age Group Championships. He was Asia's top junior player that year.
Dr. Inge was the men's singles champion of the SCAA Open in 1981 and 1983, and the men's doubles champion in 1982 and 1983. At the Hong Kong National Tennis Championships, he won the men's doubles in 1982 and both men's singles and doubles in 1983. He was a member of the Cambridge University Men's Tennis Team from 1982-87 and served as Captain in 1985.
Dr. Inge was a member of the Hong Kong Davis Cup team from 1982-1986. One of his most notable results came in 1982 when he became the first player from Hong Kong to win a Davis Cup rubber when he took both his singles against the Philippines. He also led Hong Kong to its first-ever Davis Cup victory, a 3-2 decision over Chinese Taipei in 1984 when he won the fifth and deciding rubber. Dr. Inge also served as the Hong Kong Davis Cup Captain from 1996-2000.
Biography
Edwin Tsai played men's singles and doubles at Wimbledon three years in a row from 1952-54. He also competed in mixed doubles twice in 1953 and 1954. In his maiden appearance at SW19, he fought all the way to the fifth set before he bowed out to 20-year-old Robert Haillet, who had just made his Davis Cup debut for France earlier that year. In 1953, he was victorious in the opening round against Headley Baxter, who went on to captain the British Davis Cup team in the 1960s and 70s. In the second round, however, he was stopped by American Budge Patty, the 1950 French Open and Wimbledon champion, and ranked No. 1 in the world that year by John Olliff of The Daily Telegraph. The following year, Tsai also managed to reach the second round after beating Iran's Matthew Mohtadi but exited at the hands of Australian Davis Cupper Rex Hartwig, who was ranked No. 5 in the world in 1954 by Lance Tingay of The Daily Telegraph.
Tsai also competed in the men's doubles at Wimbledon twice, playing alongside fellow Hall of Famer, Ip Koon Hung. In 1952, they reached the second round before the Aussie-American duo of Ian Ayre and Ham Richardson halted their progress. Richardson went on to win back-to-back NCAA singles titles the following two years, played on two Davis Cup winning teams, and ranked as high as No. 3 in the world in 1956 by Lance Tingay of The Daily Telegraph. Then in 1954, Tsai and Ip teamed up to beat Pierre Geelhand de Merxem of Belgium and Harry Hopman of Australia en route to round two before they were bounced by No. 3 seed Lew Hoad and Ken Rosewall. Hoad and Rosewall paired up to win three of the four Grand Slam doubles titles the previous year in 1953 and both went on attain the world No. 1 ranking in singles in 1956 and 1960, respectively. In mixed doubles, he teamed up with Bermuda's Heather Brewer to reach the last sixteen in 1953 and made the third round the following year together with American Kay Hubbell.
Locally, from 1955-60, Tsai reached six consecutive men's singles finals at the Hong Kong Grass Court Championships, a span during which he finished runner-up to Ip Koon Hung five times and once against KC Dao. In addition, he competed in eight men's doubles finals, winning in 1950, 1952, 1954-56, and 1962, and finished runner-up in 1957-58 and 1965. In mixed doubles at the Hong Kong Hardcourt Championships, he lifted titles in 1953, 1955, and 1957. Moreover, his prowess also extended to the CRC Open where he triumphed in men's singles in 1955 and won the men's doubles a record eleven times in 1949, 1952-56, 1958-61, and 1963.
Tsai captained the Hong Kong Davis Cup team in 1971 and served as Executive Vice-President of the Hong Kong Lawn Tennis Association in 1973.
Biography
After Janet moved to Hong Kong in 1973, she first became involved in several of HKTA's committees and then as an elected Councillor from 1976-82. During that time, she was the Committee Chairman for Annual Ball & Fundraising and Publicity, as well as a Committee Member to Development, Tournament, and Community Section.
From 1982-87, she became HKTA's Senior Administrator, one of the first full-time staffs employed by the Association. During this time, Janet attended several ITF Annual General Meetings as a delegate, including the year in Tours, France, when Hong Kong applied to become a member in its own right. She addressed the assembly when the motion was put forward, and subsequently accepted, as the territory became a member of the ITF as Hong Kong, China.
From 1991-2000, she was the Executive Officer for both HKTA and Hong Kong Tennis Foundation (HKTF), a role she held for nearly 9 years. During that span, she oversaw the relocation of HKTA's offices from HKSI to Victoria Park and then finally to Olympic House with the staff base increasing fourfold. In addition, with the original host nation's sudden withdrawal from the ITF Annual General Meeting in 1994, Janet was the project leader when HKTA stepped in at the eleventh hour to stage what was hailed by the delegates as the best AGM to date.
In 2005-13, Janet returned to become HKTA's General Manager and Executive Director of HKTF, a dual role she went on to fulfill for another 9 years. She spent countless hours working with HKTA's Executive Committee in negotiations with various government bodies when in 2008, the Association was finally granted the tender to take over the Kowloon Tsai Park complex to redevelop into what is now the HKTA Tennis Centre.
In 2009, she was the Tournament Director, who worked extensively with the Leisure and Cultural Services Department in the planning and upgrading of the Victoria Park Tennis Stadium complex for the East Asian Games tennis event. During her tenure, she was also the Tournament Director for an assortment of events, including an untold number of ITF Junior tournaments and other major regionals, such as the Asian Championships.
In 2006-07, Janet received an award for outstanding contributions to the development of sports and recreation from the Secretary for Home Affairs Commendation Scheme. In all, she dedicated 23 years of service to the Association and served under four HKTA Presidents, as well as four HKTF Chairmen for good measure.
Biography
Mr. Livesey arrived in Hong Kong in 1980, and held the positions of Senior Head Coach of the Jubilee Sports Center (predecessor of the Hong Kong Sports Institute) and National Coach of the Hong Kong Tennis Association until 1993.
From 1982 to 1991, he was both the captain and coach of the Hong Kong Davis Cup team. He led Hong Kong
to its first ever Davis Cup tie victory against Chinese Taipei in 1984. Mr. Livesey was also the captain and
coach of the Fed Cup team when Hong Kong first entered the competition in 1981 and held those positions until 1993. Under his captaincy in 1987, the Fed Cup team achieved its most notable result when Hong Kong defeated Finland, Belgium, Brazil and Sweden before losing to the Netherlands in the World Group consolation round final.
In 1981, with Mr. Livesey at the helm, the Hong Kong under-18 boys' team travelled to Kuala Lumpur and finished runner-up in the Head Cup, a competition that featured all the elite juniors in Southeast Asia. Mr. Livesey also led the World Youth Cup (predecessor of Junior Fed Cup) girls' team to sixth place at the 1985 World Finals, which remains Hong Kong's best result in a junior team event.
Mr. Livesey was responsible for reintroducing the women's tour to Hong Kong in 1993 with the WTA Digital Open. He set up the HKTA Coaching Award Scheme to encourage more players to become tennis coaches and launched the coaching certification courses at all levels in 1985. He was also responsible for introducing mini tennis to the tennis development model in 1986, which allowed kids to play the sports with a lot of fun at a very young age. He trained many of Hong Kong's top juniors, who all went on to compete at high-level international competitions. They include Kelvin Inge, Mark Bailey, Paul Bailey, Colin Grant, Pang Lui, Rolf Harrison, Patricia Hy, Paulette Moreno, and Willy Chan.
Mr. Livesey also owned and managed WTA and ATP tournaments in Hong Kong, Malaysia, Singapore, Taiwan and Indonesia. He was a Member of the WTA Tour Board of Directors from 2006 to 2011 and a Member of the WTA Tour Tournament Council from 2000 to 2012, representing the Asia Pacific Region.
Biography
Hong Kong's most decorated Davis Cupper who had held every all-time record in each statistical category - Most total wins (29-16), Most singles wins (17-13), Most doubles wins (12-3), Best doubles team with Michael Walker (4-1), Most ties played (21), and Most years played (11). It was not until 2011, almost 20 years after he retired from Davis Cup competition, that Yu Hiu Tung surpassed his record in the Most ties played category.
Bailey made his Davis Cup debut in January 1982 against Philippines in Group II at age 18 years and 10 months, playing doubles alongside his junior cohort, Kelvin Ng.
Job Titles:
- Chief Executive Officer
- Member of the Executive Committee
Job Titles:
- Member of the Executive Committee
Job Titles:
- Member of the Executive Committee
Job Titles:
- Chairman of the Executive Committee
Job Titles:
- Member of the Executive Committee
Job Titles:
- Member of the Executive Committee
Biography
Sister of M.W. Lo, Mrs. Enid Lo-Litton won an impressive 13 titles at the Hong Kong Hardcourt Championships over a 24-year span. She won six mixed doubles titles between 1928-1952; four ladies' singles titles between 1930-1939; and four ladies' doubles titles between 1931-1950. Prior to World War II, she was the only player to win the Treble - singles, doubles, and mixed - during the same year at the Hong Kong Hardcourt Championships in 1932.
Biography
Ng Sze Kwong ended the initial dominance of H.A. Nisbet and S.E. Green when he won six straight men's singles crowns at the Hong Kong Grass Court Championships from 1918-1923. In doing so, he was the first local Chinese to win the Hong Kong title. In the doubles, he partnering Wong Po Keung to win the first three editions from 1917-1919 and again with Wei Wing Lock to claim back-to-back titles in from 1922-1923. He also represented China in the Far Eastern Games in Shanghai in 1921 (Tennis Captain) and Osaka in 1923. He was selected to China's Olympic men's lawn tennis team for Paris 1924 that comprised Wei Wing Lock, Ng Sze Cheung, and Penang-raised Khoo Hooi-Hye, forming the first-ever Chinese delegation sent to compete at the Olympiad. Ng was slated to face Augustos Zerlendis of Greece in the first round of the men's singles. In men's doubles, Ng Sze Kwong and Wei Wing Lock received a bye and were supposed to face Finland's Runar Granholm and Boris Schildtwere in the second round. Although the players attended the opening ceremony, the team, for reasons unknown, conceded a forfait general at the eleventh hour, as documented by the Official Report of the Games of the VIII Olympiad, Paris, 1924.
Ng Sze Kwong would return to play in Hong Kong again, finishing runner-up in 1927 to S.A. Rumjahn, who went on to capture four more singles titles at the Hong Kong Grass Court Championships. In 1928, the China National Amateur Athletic Foundation announced the appointment of Ng Sze Kwong as the Davis Cup Captain to lead the team against the United States. Ng was also invited to join China's Davis Cup Selection Committee to assist in choosing the 1935 team. As a pioneer of Chinese sportsmen to hold prominent positions in various clubs and associations, Ng had been President of the Hong Kong-Chinese Amateur Athletic Federation, All China Lawn Tennis Association and, from 1921-1930, Chairman of the Chinese Recreation Club.
Biography
Prior to arriving in Hong Kong, King peaked at a career-high ATP No. 269 in singles in 1977 and competed in singles qualifying and maindraw doubles at the US Open at Forest Hills that year. He was a four-time US Chinese National champion and played for the University of Southern California from 1968-1969 despite offers from Columbia and Stanford. King, who was twice Oregon Boy's State Singles Champion in 1966 and 1968, won the Pacific Northwest Under-18 Sectionals in 1967 and finished that year ranked No. 1.
In 1978, King beat No. 1 seed and reigning South East Asian Games champion Atet Wijono of Indonesia in the final 7-6(5) 6-2 to capture the Hong Kong Invitational Hardcourt Championships. From 1980-1986, he won 15 majors (6 singles and 9 doubles) over a six-year span. From 1980-82, he captured three straight CRC Open men's singles titles and, at the time, only Ip Koon Hung (1957-60 & 1962-64) and Tau Luu (1970-77) had won three or more at the club. Moreover, King managed to capture 2 out of the 3 local majors each year in 1980, 1981 and 1985. He also teamed up with Tau Luu to win the men's doubles at all three local majors - Hong Kong Closed Hardcourt Championships (now Hong Kong National Tennis Championships), SCAA Open, and CRC Open - in 1985. At the Hong Kong Closed Hardcourt Championships, King won six consecutive men's doubles titles from 1980-1985.
From 1984-86, King represented Hong Kong in five Davis Cup ties. In 1984, he teamed up with Kelvin Inge to win the crucial doubles against Chinese Taipei in what turned out to be Hong Kong's maiden Davis Cup tie victory. In the ensuing quarterfinals, King played No. 1 singles and doubles with Kelvin Inge against Thailand. He then won crucial doubles rubbers that contributed to eventual victories for Hong Kong, joining forces again with Kelvin Inge against Singapore in 1985 and together with Mark Bailey in a five-set win against Malaysia in 1986.
King also served as an HKTA Councillor from 1985-87 and is a member of the International Lawn Tennis Club (IC) of Hong Kong. He was the official Welcoming Dinner's Master of Ceremonies when IC of Hong Kong hosted the Asia/Oceania IC Rod Laver Junior Challenge for the first time in 2019.
Biography
The younger brother of Tsui Wai Pui, they joined forces to become the only duo from Hong Kong to capture a gold medal at the nationwide level when they won the men's doubles title at the 1948 China National Games in Shanghai. Tsui Yun Pui won the men's singles at the Hong Kong Grass Court Championships in 1941 and finished runner-up four times. At the Hong Kong Hardcourt Championships, he was a 5-time runner-up in singles. In all, the Tsui brothers collaborated on thirteen major men's doubles titles.