A scene from the women's tournament at Seoul 1988.
One level of intricacy removed from football, the game that's so simple that the name explains it, field hockey is stick plus ball. Some believe that the name "hockey" derives from the shepherd's crooked stick (hoquet in French), but the real answer is lost to history.
What is known is that humans have been hitting balls with sticks, and trying to propel those orbs past each other, since the days of the Pyramids. The Greeks played it, early Europeans did too, and the British Hockey Association organized under a rulebook in 1886. London 1908 saw the start of Olympic play, when England, Ireland, Scotland and Wales took the top four slots. Germany was the only other country to win a game.
Before the sun started setting on the British Empire, field hockey was the primary method for colonized countries to get revenge against their conquerors. India won eight gold medals in Olympic play (peace pioneer Mahatma Gandhi famously claimed no knowledge of the game), and the country's men's team ran a winning streak from 1928 through 1960 after the British introduced field hockey. (This could have also been revenge for stealing "poona" and making it "badminton").
The modern game is played on a large field 100 yards in length, the same length as an American football field but 14 yards shorter than the pitch used in world football. Since Montreal 1976, the field has been made from artificial turf.
Like football, there are 11 players per side and they are organized into forwards, midfielders and defenders. The rulebook is far more complex, as each non-goaltender is wielding what amounts to a weapon and are firing a ball that's the same size as a baseball and is much harder. In order to keep things organized and safe, the game is filled with a lot of no-no's.
Goalies wear full padding, and are the only players permitted to kick or stop the ball with their feet. Major fouls result in a seven-meter penalty shot. Penalty strokes are also used to break ties in the medal round if a 7 1/2 minute golden goal overtime can't settle things.
Field Hockey Fun Facts:
- The Australian "Kookaburras" men's team spent the 1990's climbing up the world rankings, while earning a silver at Barcelona in 1992 and a bronze at Atlanta. At home in Sydney, the team lost in excruciatingly heartbreaking fashion to the Netherlands in the semifinals, drawing the Olympic champions to a tie in regulation before losing in the fifth penalty round.
In Athens four years later, the two teams met in an elimination game again, but this time it was the gold medal final. This one went into overtime too.
- One nation that won't be participating in Beijing is India, which as you can see below is the all-time leaders in field hockey medals. The men's national team has fallen on hard times, a topic this blog discussed in detail back in June.
- It's one of the lesser-known medal stand protests, but after a Pakistan-Germany gold medal final at Minich 1972, the Pakistanis were so angry at officiating during the 1-0 loss that they turned their backs on the German flag during the anthem. The team was banned for life for their display, but were reinstated in time for 1976. Pakistan won bronze in Montreal, and watched New Zealand's flag rise to the rafters.
- Field hockey for women made its debut at Moscow 1980, and as the Western boycott deprived the field of the world's best. The story of South African apartheid keeping that country out of the Games from 1964 through 1992, but fellow African nation Rhodesia was under the same restrictions for having white rule despite a black population majority.
When the nation became independent and named itself Zimbabwe in 1980, one of its first orders of business was to go to Moscow and win the gold medal in women's field hockey. In five games, the team gave up just five goals, still an Olympic women's field hockey record.
In 2008:
The field hockey tournaments, which will take place on the Olympic Green in downtown Beijing, will begin on Day 2 (August 10) and conclude on the last Saturday of the Games (August 23). The women's final is on Day 14 (the 22nd), and the men's final concludes things the next day.
Here are the tournament pools, which were determined in April by International Hockey Federation world rankings.
Men
Pool A: Belgium, China, Germany, South Korea, New Zealand, Spain
Pool B: Australia, Canada, Great Britain, Netherlands, Pakistan, South Africa
Women
Pool A: Australia, China, South Korea, Netherlands, South Africa, Spain
Pool B: Argentina, Germany, Great Britain, Japan, New Zealand, United States
Teams will play each other pool member once, then the top two teams will square off in crossover semifinals. The remaining teams will play in classification matches.
All-Time Medal Standings:
| Nation | Gold | Silver | Bronze | Total |
|---|---|---|---|---|
 | 8 | 1 | 2 | 11 |
 | 4 | 3 | 3 | 10 |
 | 3 | 4 | 6 | 13 |
 | 3 | 3 | 2 | 8 |
 | 3 | 2 | 5 | 10 |
 | 2 | 2 | 2 | 6 |
| | 1 | 3 | 0 | 4 |
 | 1 | 2 | 1 | 4 |
 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 1 |
 | 0 | 3 | 0 | 3 |
 | 0 | 1 | 1 | 2 |
 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
 | 0 | 1 | 0 | 1 |
 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 2 |
 | 0 | 0 | 2 | 2 |
 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
 | 0 | 0 | 1 | 1 |
(Photo via 1988 Official Report; rules diagram adapted from The Rule Book)
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Sportswriter 
