What do you think the future holds for the development of junior golf in Hong Kong?
Now that the HSBC Golf for Schools initiative has started, the next stage will be how the HKGA connects this grassroots programme to the elite junior programme. There’s a middle ground of players in Hong Kong who aren’t yet at the level where they can be considered elite … we need them to be playing and improving. To do that we need more help from the government, ideally in the form of our own course. Hong Kong doesn’t need three new championship-standard golf courses. What we need is a facility, an easy accessible nine holes, for instance, where kids can go and regularly play and practice.
Is that a realistic proposition?
It’s a long-term goal and for what I’m talking about it wouldn’t require a vast amount of land. Certainly not land that the government would want to use for residential use. When people think of sparing land for a golf course they automatically think of a championship golf course and the vast area that would require. A relatively simple nine-hole course is a different proposition entirely.
But going forward, if Hong Kong golf is to improve further we need to maintain the courses that we have access to. The Hong Kong Golf Club has opened up to us in a major way - Fanling is essentially our home course - so it is imperative that the government supports all the clubs. If we don’t have the courses there can’t be growth and we would struggle to maintain the sport at a reasonable level.
What have been the highlights for you over the last eight years?
Obviously the individual gold medal that Tiffany Chan earned at the World University Championship last year would be one, as would her fourth place finish at the World Junior Championship a few years ago. We’ve had a number of boys finishing in the top-15 in that event as well. As far as the team results go, the silver medal that Hong Kong earned at the National Games in China in 2013 and the second place at the Putra Cup, which was held at Clearwater Bay Golf and Country Club in 2011, stood out. The latter saw Shinichi Mizuno, Liu Lok-tin, Terrence Ng and Jason Hak put in a great performance, whilst Motin Yeung spearheaded the Hong Kong side in the former. There’s no reason why we can’t continue getting results like these as long as we continue to have young players of world-class caliber.
Talking of Motin Yeung and Jason Hak - they’re two players who were raised overseas and who haven’t gone through the junior development programme. Was it ever an issue selecting them to represent Hong Kong?
They might not have been a part of our programme but they’re definitely part of Hong Kong. They were born in Hong Kong and moved away with their families when they were young. We talked about it in the committee and were really encouraged that they wanted to play for us. So no, it wasn’t really an issue. More players who are based overseas are enquiring about representing us which is good.
