Lim Tong Hai (born 14 May 1969) was a

centre-back In the sport of association football, a defender is an outfield player whose primary role is to stop attacks during the game and prevent the opposition from scoring. Defenders fall into four main categories: centre-backs, full-backs, sweepers ...

for the

Singapore national football team The Singapore national football team represents Singapore in the senior men's international football. It is organised by the Football Association of Singapore (FAS), the governing body of football in Singapore, which is affiliated with the Asi ...

from 1989 to 1999. He held various backroom roles at former club

Geylang United Geylang International Football Club is a professional football club based in Bedok, Singapore, that competes in Singapore Premier League, the top division of football in Singapore. The club was founded in 1973 and played their first season in 1 ...

after retiring from his playing career until his departure in 2012. Lim is widely considered one of the greatest defenders in Singapore's history. He was renowned for his marking, awareness and ability to anticipate a threat from the opposition. A precise tackler and an imposing defensive presence, Lim was also known for his aerial ability, strength, man-marking and tactical knowledge

Club career

Geylang International

Lim played for

Geylang International Geylang International Football Club is a professional football club based in Bedok, Singapore, that competes in Singapore Premier League, the top division of football in Singapore. The club was founded in 1973 and played their first season ...

in the

FAS Premier League The Football Association of Singapore Premier League was a semi-professional football league competition held in Singapore between 1988 and 1995. The Premier League succeeded the National Football League Division One as the top tier of the Singapo ...

Singapore FA

In 1994, Lim signed for

Singapore FA Singapore FA was a representative team of the Football Association of Singapore in competitions run by the Football Association of Malaysia, separate from the Singapore national football team, Singapore national team. Despite dissolving in 19 ...

. He formed a strong partnership with South Korean

Jang Jung Jang Jung () is a South Korean former footballer who mostly played as a centre-back throughout his entire career. Playing career Club career Jang formerly played with Lucky-Goldstar Hwangso in South Korea. In 1989, he joined Perak FA in ...

in the heart of defence as the Lions achieved the

M-League The Malaysian League, also known as the M-League ( Malay: ''Liga Malaysia'' or ''Liga-M''), is a terminology used to describe the professional football league in Malaysia. The terminology was mainly used to describe the league and its divisions ...

and

Malaysia Cup The Malaysia Cup (), formerly known as Malaya Cup, is an annual football tournament in Malaysia, held at the end of the calendar year. The cup was first held in 1921. Despite its prestige and popularity as the country's oldest cup tournament, i ...

double in 1994.

Tiong Bahru United (Now known as Tanjong Pagar United)

With the withdrawal of the Lions from Malaysian competitions and subsequent launch of the S.League, Lim signed for Tiong Bahru United in 1996. In 1998, the club changed it named to

Tanjong Pagar United Tanjong Pagar United Football Club is a professional association football, football club based in Queenstown, Singapore, Queenstown, Singapore. The club currently competes in the Singapore Premier League, the top tier of Singapore football leag ...

and he captained the club in its debut season to a

Singapore Cup The Singapore Cup is an annual knockout football competition in men's domestic Singaporean football. Established in 1998, it is the foremost prestigious cup competition in the country. It is open to clubs in the Singapore Premier League. Since ...

and

Singapore FA Cup The Singapore FA Cup, (also known as the Singapore Pools FA Cup for sponsorship reasons), is an annual association football, football competition in Singapore. After the Singapore Cup and earlier Singapore League Cup, League Cup, the Singapore FA ...

double.

Geylang United

Lim made a return to

in 2002, playing a further 2 seasons until he retired as a player in 2003 where he won the

International career

Lim was part of the

at the

1993 Southeast Asian Games The 1993 Southeast Asian Games, officially known as the 17th Southeast Asian Games, were a multi-sport event held in Singapore from 12 to 20 June 1993 with 29 sports featured in this edition. The games were opened by Wee Kim Wee, the President ...

where Singapore won the bronze medal. In the semi-finals against

Myanmar Myanmar, officially the Republic of the Union of Myanmar; and also referred to as Burma (the official English name until 1989), is a country in northwest Southeast Asia. It is the largest country by area in Mainland Southeast Asia and has ...

, after Singapore was 2–0 up, Lim in two attempts to clear the ball in the penalty area, scored two own goals instead, causing the match to be a draw at 2–2 in full time. The match went into extra time which was a draw again at 3–3 but Singapore lost the match in the resulting penalty shootouts 4–5.

Coaching career

Lim retired from playing in 2003 and was appointed coach for Geylang United's

Prime League The Prime League was the reserve and youth team football league of Singapore's S.League. Teams involved in the league are primarily made up of youth players from the S.League clubs. The Prime League was founded in 1997. S.League clubs are requir ...

team the following year. In 2006, he was promoted to caretaker coach of the first team and was likely to continue to lead the team for the 2007 S.League season as he was ready to rebuild the team after years of dismal results in the league, where Geylang United was last in the standings. However, there was a turn of fortunes when Lim led Geylang to a much-improved 2007 season high of 4th in the S-League table. There were much changes in the Geylang United side with Kim Grant, Noh Rahman,

Hassan Sunny Hassan bin Abdullah Sunny (born 2 April 1984), better known as Hassan Sunny, is a Singaporean professional footballer who plays as a goalkeeper for Singapore Premier League (S-League'')'' club Albirex Niigata (S). In 2016, UK based ''The Da ...

and Lim leading the team for a better start for the 2007 S-League season. In late 2007, he assumed the role of team manager when Slovak Jozef Herel was brought in as Geylang's coach.

Management career

In September 2013, Lim was appointed to the

Football Association of Singapore The Football Association of Singapore (FAS) is the governing body responsible for the administration of football in Singapore. Established in 1892 as the Singapore Football Association (SFA), it is the oldest football association in all of ...

council. He is also the chairman of the FAS' Referees' Committee.

Post-football career

Post football, Lim became a sports and wellness senior lecturer with the

Institute of Technical Education The Institute of Technical Education (ITE) is a post-secondary education institution and statutory board under the purview of the Ministry of Education in Singapore. Established by the Ministry of Education, it was formerly known as Vocational ...

College East and also a physical education and sports science consultant with

National Institute of Education The National Institute of Education (NIE) is an autonomous institute of Nanyang Technological University (NTU) in Singapore. Ranked 10th in the world and 2nd in Asia by the QS World University Rankings in the subject of Education and Trainin ...

. He is currently with

Sport Singapore Sport Singapore (SportSG) is a statutory board under the Ministry of Culture, Community and Youth of the Government of Singapore. It is the lead agency tasked with developing a holistic sports culture for the nation. History Sport Singapore was ...

as a Team Lead for the Coaching Industry Development (CID) team within CoachSG. In 2023, Lim, alongside Jasmine Yeong-Nathan, was the assistant chef-de-mission for the Singapore delegation to the

2023 SEA Games The 2023 Southeast Asian Games (, UNGEGN: ''Kar Brâkuŏt Keila Brâchéachéatĕ Asi Aknéy 2023''), also known as the 32nd Southeast Asian Games, or the 32nd SEA Games, and commonly known as Cambodia 2023, were the 32nd edition of the Southe ...

Personal life

Lim is married and has 2 children. His uncle,

Lim Teong Kim Datuk Lim Teong Kim (; born 26 August 1963) is a Malaysian professional football coach and former player, who is recently appointed as head coach of Malaysian club Perak FC starting from 2023 season. He was formerly an assistant coach of Baye ...

is a formerly an

assistant coach An athletic coach is a person coaching in sport, involved in the direction, instruction, and training of a sports team or athlete. History The original sense of the word ''Coach'' is that of a Coach (carriage), horse-drawn carriage, deriving ul ...

of Bayern Munich U-19, head coach of Malaysia U-17 and head coach of

Perak Perak (; Perak Malay: ''Peghok'') is a States and federal territories of Malaysia, state of Malaysia on the west coast of the Malay Peninsula. Perak has land borders with the Malaysian states of Kedah to the north, Penang to the northwest, Kel ...

Statistics

International goals

Honours

Club

Singapore FA

1994 The year 1994 was designated as the " International Year of the Family" and the "International Year of Sport and the Olympic Ideal" by the United Nations. In the Line Islands and Phoenix Islands of Kiribati, 1994 had only 364 days, omitti ...

: 1994

Tanjong Pagar United

: 1998 *

: 1998

Geylang United

: 2003

References

External links

* {{DEFAULTSORT:Lim, Tong Hai 1969 births Men's association football defenders Living people Singaporean men's footballers Singapore men's international footballers Singapore Premier League players Singaporean sportspeople of Chinese descent Geylang International FC players Singapore FA players Singaporean football managers Singapore Premier League managers Jurong FC players Tanjong Pagar United FC players SEA Games silver medalists for Singapore SEA Games medalists in football Competitors at the 1993 SEA Games