Last year, Murray moved back to his hometown of Vernon in British Columbia, Canada, together with his wife and two young children to answer to his calling in the real estate business. Tennishk.org conversed with him on his many fond tennis memories during his time here in Hong Kong.

Whilst in Hong Kong, the Canadian native was Elite Squad Coach under Mark Bailey at the Sports Institute between 1993 and 1996, a period during which he got to work with numerous top local juniors such as Sven Koehler, Thorsten Poelzl, Melvin Tong, Jason Sankey, Wayne Wong, Willie Chan, Jackie Fu and Tong Ka Po, among others. However, the player he spent most time with was probably John Hui, whom Murray had travelled with on many of his forays overseas in top junior events around the world such as the Junior Slams, up until he went to college in the US.

"John and his Japanese partner Yaoki Ishii beating the No. 1 seeds from Venezuela, Keplerin Orellana and Yohny Romero, in the Boys' Doubles at the 1995 US Open was great to watch. A lot of the big name juniors at that time had a lot of respect for John's doubles game, even though he always seemed to play with different partners all the time because there was usually no other player from HK travelling with him. It's no real surprise that he did so well for himself in college and in the pro ranks, getting to the Top-160."

Even though Murray did not get any court time, he was nominated together with Mike Walker, Colin Grant and Pang Lui as the four HK players to face Japan in the Asia/Oceania Zone Group I away tie in 1993. As only coincidence would have it, Gouichi Motomura also made his debut for his country in that very same tie and the veteran Japanese Davis Cupper is still going strong today, as evidenced by his record-equalling 22nd tie in his nation's 5-0 defeat of China just earlier this month.

For the following four Davis Cup ties - against Indonesia in 1994, and India, Japan, and Taiwan in 1995 (all Group I affairs) - Murray was either trainer or coach of the Hong Kong team. Murray cites the March 1995 tie against Japan in Fujisawa as one of the most memorable Davis Cup moments for him when Hong Kong's Melvin Tong made his live singles debut against Shuzo Matsuoka, who was ranked as high as No. 46 three years earlier.

Recounted Murray: "Not many HK people saw it but I remember Melvin going toe-to-toe with Shuzo Matsuoka and the crowd couldn't believe seeing Melvin, who nobody had heard of and who was half the size of Matsuoka (a Japanese national hero), hanging tough with him for 2 sets before going down. It was a packed house, and it was indoors, so you could imagine the decibels. Although Matsuoka won, 7-5, 6-1, 6-1, it was close and Melvin did himself proud. It was one of those matches where the big player just didn't know anything about the other guy and Melvin was in the zone. It still wasn't enough in the end, but I had been a big fan of Melvin's ever since that performance. If he had a bigger body, he could've had a shot at bigger things."

"Then there was this dead rubber win in the previous tie against India that was quite an upset when Thorsten Poelzl beat Mahesh Bhupathi in Calcutta, 7-6(6), 7-5…I think that was the last time anyone in India considered Bhupathi for a Davis Cup singles spot!" said Murray tongue-in-cheek.

When posed with the question of when we will see a local player crack the world's Top-100, Murray responded: "Most people don't realize just how big a jump it is from being a top junior to making it as a top pro. Hong Kong had consistently developed top juniors for years. Many theories have bounced around...pampered kids, not enough lower-tiered pro events locally on a consistent basis, business mind set as opposed to athletic mind set, etc. Take your pick, but probably a combination of all the above and more."

He went on, "Basically you don't need a player with the entire package to come along, but you need one who has almost an entire package, and what they lack can't be that far off. It comes down to the player, who has to really, really, really want to do what it takes to go from a being a touted, top junior to the wars of the pro game. As much as top players nowadays seem to all have entourages of people taking care of them, inside they are fiercely competitive and independent individuals who have huge desires to win and they don't get overly satisfied with local or regional renown."

"Take Paradorn Srichapan, for example. He didn't get produced by some great tennis programme; he simply had a family who was into it all the way, had great talent, an athletes' body, and he wanted it," added Murray. "I remember at tournaments with John Hui (John would play doubles and practiced with him quite often) that after matches, Paradorn would be doing push-ups, go running, etc. It's not that other kids don't do that, but they usually have to be prodded into it, and you could tell he had his eye on things bigger than just junior titles."

The former Football Club and American Club Head Pro cited some of his best wins in the territory were winning doubles titles at the CRC Open (1996, 2001), SCAA Open (1994, 2002), and the HK Nationals (2003). He was also only one of three players to have beaten Michael Walker in singles in Hong Kong - the other two being former teen prodigy and one-time Hong Kong resident, Fredrik Bach, plus ex-Hong Kong number one, Pang Lui.

Tennis aside, during his sixteen years in the concrete jungle, Murray also found the time to dabble in a little Thai kickboxing down in Mongkok and picked up squash which, he claims, still play on a regular basis.

"My wife [Dimple] and I both miss the energy of Hong Kong and the people we met. But I always thought HK is a strikingly beautiful place, with great vistas, beautiful drives along the south side, interesting buildings (new & old) mixed with unusual landscapes. There's really no where else like it."

"I had just recently become a licensed Realtor for RE/MAX Vernon and the team I work for is Bennetto & Associates. My father has been in real estate here for 36 years and it's something I was always thinking of going into when I thought the time was right," said Murray. "Also, Vernon is where I grew up and I thought it would be the perfect setting for the upbringing of my two young kids, Ryan and Leena."

Along with beginning a new career in real estate, Murray will try to keep in touch with tennis as much as possible. He had been coaching a junior who is ranked quite high in the Boys' 18U division in BC and will attempt to keep his own game sharp as well to compete in the ITF over-45 Circuit in a couple of years' time.

When asked if he would be coaching his kids anytime soon, bearing in mind that former Hong Kong standout, Paulette Moreno, had already ruled herself out with that lofty task, Murray's response was: "Coaching my kids? I can't even get them to go to bed on time! Seriously, I would love to coach them, but they're still a bit young (3 & 2). Time will tell if it becomes a good fit. Some highly qualified coaches can't get through to their own kids, and some parents with a limited tennis background really helped their kids. Either way, I would like to think that being in the game as long as I have that I will be able to identify when to back off and hand them over to a good pro, if that time ever comes."

Wise words indeed.