Quick Facts
LibraBiography
Chan Yuen-ting (陳婉婷; born 7 October 1988) is an association football player and manager of the Eastern Sports Club in the Hong Kong Premier League. She is the first female manager to lead a men's professional association football team in a nation's top domestic division to a league championship.
Career
In December 2015, Chan was appointed as the manager of Eastern Sports Club in the Hong Kong Premier League, replacing Yeung Ching Kwong. She was the first female manager in the league.
Chan became interested in association football through her admiration as a teenager for David Beckham. Chan graduated from the Chinese University of Hong Kong with a geography degree in 2010, and achieved a master's degree in sports science and health management during her time at Pegasus and Southern. Despite her parents' initial desire that Chan pursue a more stable career, her first position after graduating from university was as a data analyst for Hong Kong Pegasus FC (then known as TSW Pegasus FC). Prior to joining Eastern Sports Club, she worked as an assistant manager at fellow Hong Kong Premier League clubs Pegasus FC and Southern District FC. She also held coaching roles with the Hong Kong women's national association football and futsal teams, and plays at the non-professional club level for a team from Sha Tin. During her time with Pegasus FC, Chan led their under-18 team to three trophies.
Chan led Eastern to win the 2015–16 season, losing only one of the fifteen games played since Chan took over. With Eastern's victory, Chan became the first woman to coach a men's professional association football team to the championship of a national football association's top league. Eastern also won the 2015–16 Hong Kong Senior Challenge Shield, only a month after Chan's appointment.
In a March 2016 interview, Chan expressed an interest in managing teams elsewhere in Asia that had more established football cultures, but also that she hopes that her success steers investment into football in Hong Kong.
In 2016, she was chosen as one of BBC's 100 Women