News for 15 April 2020
All the news for Wednesday 15 April 2020
Passion and enjoyment are key for dazzling Delfina Merino
On the 15th October 2010, Argentina striker Delfina Merino celebrated her 21st birthday and had already achieved more than most manage to do in their entire careers.
In her breakthrough year of 2009, a teenaged ‘Delfi’ won silver at the Junior World Cup (Boston, USA) and won both the Pan American Cup (Hamilton, BER) and Champions Trophy (Sydney, AUS) in her debut year with Las Leonas. It was a strong start for the exceptional young attacker, who relished the opportunity to play alongside the great Luciana Aymar, a player Merino had watch on TV in the middle of the night throughout Argentina’s Olympic silver medal success at the Sydney 2000 Games.
Whilst 2009 was undisputedly a good year, 2010 proved to be even better. A second of what would be five successive Champions Trophy victories arrived in Nottingham, England in July before a sensational dream was realised: becoming a world champion on home soil in Rosario in September of that year.
Now 30 and rapidly closing in on 300 international appearances, Delfina Merino has been widely considered as one of the world’s finest players for the best part of a decade. As well as becoming an Olympic silver medallist at London 2012 and winning numerous Pan American titles, she was also named FIH Hockey Stars Player of the Year for 2017, becoming the first Argentine player to win the prize since Luciana Aymar collected the last of her record eight titles in 2013.
Despite having enjoyed a number of seasons playing club hockey in the Netherlands with SCHC, Merino has spent the vast majority of her career with Banco Provincia in Buenos Aires, where her father, mother and brother all played. Merino’s focus for 2020 has been very much with the Argentine national team, where a strong showing in the FIH Hockey Pro League would have been perfect preparation toward the goal of winning a first ever Olympic gold medal for Argentina women at Tokyo 2020.
Sadly, the ongoing COVID-19 global health crisis has forced the postponement of the Games until 2021, with Merino switching her focus from Tokyo to encouraging everyone via her social media channels to stay home and stay safe whilst also offering some fantastic skills videos to keep everyone entertained.
Delfina Merino, one of the true superstars of Argentine hockey, speaks to FIH about her career to date, her personal highlights and much more.
Hi Delfi, thank you for talking to us. Since making your Argentina debut in 2009, you have experienced some incredible moments in your career. What are your reflections about your achievements?
Delfina Merino: “My reflections on my career is that I am very happy with what I have achieved, and the way it has been. I hope many nice moments are coming ahead. But the most amazing thing about my career is that I feel really lucky, happy and honoured to be playing for the national team. It had been a dream [of mine] since I was really young, so to have the opportunity to make this dream real, play for Las Leonas and represent my country – playing hockey, my great passion – it means a lot to me. I’m really grateful and feel really honoured. I hope I can keep enjoying doing what I love.”
Who or what first influenced you to pick up a stick and play hockey?
Delfina Merino: “I started to play hockey when I was five years old at Banco Provincia, which is my club in Buenos Aires, Argentina. I think one of the main reasons why me and my brother [Gonzalo, a Pan American Cup winner with Argentina men in 2017] play hockey is because our parents played hockey at Banco when they were young. Since we were born, hockey has been with us and we are, really, a hockey family.”
Who has been the biggest influence on your career and why?
Delfina Merino: “One of the biggest influences on my career and my hockey has been my family, but at the same time if I have to think about players, I really think about the Las Leonas team [that played] in Sydney 2000 [Olympic Games]. They had a really big tournament in Australia, and I was a really big fan of the team when I was around 11 or 12 years old. I woke up every night to see the game of Las Leonas. I was a big fan of Vanina Oneto, Magui Aicega, Luciana Aymar, Soledad Garcia, Karina Masotta – they were all amazing players. I remember watching them and wanting to be like them when I was older. That team really inspired my passion for hockey and Las Leonas.”
If there was one sentence to sum up your playing style or attitude on the pitch, what would it be?
Delfina Merino: “One of the attitudes I try to show on the field is to be passionate. I’m really passionate about playing hockey and I love to represent my country, so I try to give everything and put all of my passion onto the field. I also try to enjoy it. Personally, I really enjoy [being on] the field, it’s really easy to play and I have a great time. I try to combine both things, my passionate [attitude] and to enjoy what I am doing.”
What would be the best advice you could give to aspiring young hockey players?
Delfina Merino: “The advice I would give to a young hockey player is first, to do what you love. If it is hockey it’s hockey, but if it’s another sport it’s also okay! Try to do something you really enjoy, something you really feel happy doing. I think that when you do what you love it’s really easy to be good at it, and to put a lot of effort in it to try to improve. The most important thing is if you start playing hockey and you like it, just continue to do it. You will find friends; you will find different things that will be really helpful for your life.”
Profile*: Delfina Merino – Argentina
Nickname: ‘Delfi’
Position: Striker
Shirt number: 12
Age: 30
International appearances: 294
Place of birth: Vincente López, Greater Buenos Aires (ARG)
Clubs: Banco Provincia (ARG) | SCHC (NED)
You can follow Delfina Merino on Twitter (@delfinamerino) and Instagram (delfinamerino).
* Information correct as of 14 April 2020.
FIH site
How Covid-19 Is affecting Canadian national team athletes
Athletes around the country are adapting and finding positives within the uncertainty
By Joshua Rey
The Covid-19 outbreak has greatly affected the sporting world, and field hockey in Canada is no exception. For national team athletes, it has been a challenge to adapt to the changing landscape. With games, training and even the Tokyo 2020 Summer Olympic Games postponed, players have been at home instead of on the pitch.
The men’s national team was supposed to be going to Tokyo for the Olympics this summer but they will have to wait another year. Oliver Schofield, a forward for Team Canada said the news was a shock for the team but was inevitable.
“I don’t think I really knew how to feel,” said Schofield. “I mean, it was sort of inevitable that it was gonna happen because of the state of everything else. Major leagues were postponing or cancelling anyway but at the end of the day it’s the right thing and it needed to happen.”
On March 22nd, Canada announced they would not send any athletes to the Olympics in Tokyo and a few days later, the games were postponed to July 23rd to August 8th, 2021.
Schofield and the rest of the team still have their mindset on the games in 2021. He’s been doing drills at home and going for runs and bike rides early in the morning while keeping a safe distance from others. He also has stayed connected with the team through group chats and has been video-calling his family in the UK. Schofield also said the whole situation has been weird for him.
“The way that we’re wired is to always be doing something and always be pushing ourselves to our limits,” said Schofield. “ And that’s been tough in isolation, but just trying to be productive as well and not just sitting around doing nothing.”
Kat Leahy, Oliver Scholfield and Alison Lee talk about the challenges in the new and changing environment. Photos: Yan Huckendubler
Kathleen Leahy is a defender for the women’s national team and is isolated with two teammates. Considering the nation-wide facility closures, they have been doing bodyweight workouts to keep in shape during this time.
“We’re pretty lucky to be isolated where we are, we’re right on the beach on the water,” said Leahy. “So we have access to kayaks and we’ve been able to do some bike rides because we live in a pretty isolated place so we don’t see anyone on the rides.”
Not being able to see family during this time is an added challenge for Leahy.
“The hardest part I think is just not being allowed to go see people and [I miss] the physical contact and stuff with the friends and family,” said Leahy. “It’s really tough for me not to be able to go see my grandmother. I haven’t seen her since I left for Europe in February and It’s her birthday coming up. So it’s gonna be pretty tough not to be able to give her a hug but we all understand that it’s what’s best for everyone at the moment.”
Leahy and teammate Alison Lee are also members of the indoor national team and were supposed to play in an Indoor World Cup qualifier last month but it got cancelled. Lee said the hardest part of this pandemic is how much it affects all facets of life, not just hockey.
“I’d have to say the hardest part about being in quarantine is the disruption of normal life,” said Lee. “Going to the grocery store, going to the gym, going to the mall, going over to a friends house for dinner, all the things that we are used to taking for granted in ‘normal’ life have been taken away and now we are having to create a new normal at home.”
With so much uncertainty swirling around when they will be back training and on the pitch, the athletes agree all they can do is try their best to stay fit, healthy and prepared.
Field Hockey Canada media release
Hollie Pearne-Webb: Great Britain women’s captain on NHS volunteering and triple Olympic hopes
By The Hockey Paper
Great Britain hockey captain Hollie Pearne-Webb PIC: Worldsportpics
Everyone may know someone who has been touched by tragedy by the time the coronavirus epidemic is over. This includes Hollie Pearne-Webb, Great Britain women’s hockey captain. “It’s made it all very real,” she says.
In normal circumstances, Pearne-Webb would be preparing for the resumption of the Pro League, a clash against Holland at the end of the month no less. Instead, she is currently keeping fit in her garage, has signed up for the NHS volunteer scheme and assisting her village having been assigned a pod by community volunteers.
Further, she is looking to finish her accountancy exams before the rescheduled Tokyo Olympics, all this while keeping up with the GB women’s squad on Zoom. Who knows, she may even sit down to watch the Rio final for the first time if the BBC re-run that golden night in full in the coming weeks.
Pearne-Webb, of course, was the last player to shoot in anger at an Olympics and – despite Tokyo being delayed by one year – she is now the first to admit that she hopes to become a triple Olympian.
“I never had plans to retire post-Tokyo,” she tells The Hockey Paper. “It’s hard to say as you don’t know how you will feel but I’m pretty sure it won’t be the end. A home Commonwealth Games is a huge draw, there is a World Cup as well and an Olympics in Paris three years after this one.
“Who knows, but I can’t see myself retiring. I still have the love for the game and the drive and determination to achieve more. As long as that’s there, I don’t want to stop.”
Pearne-Webb will be 30 in September and admits to being in the “lucky” position of following in the captaincy footsteps of Kate Richardson-Walsh, then Alex Danson. “Kate was my captain for four years and was phenomenal in her job,” said Pearne-Webb, who outside of hockey works part-time for Defra, the government’s environment department.
“I never thought during that time that I needed to watch her carefully because maybe I will be captain [one day]. I never thought that. But it was more admiring the role she played in that while Alex led in a completely different way but was a huge leader that everyone respected.
“It’s hard to compare yourself and you can’t do that with those two players. But both of them have said they are always there, along with Helen [Kate’s wife].”
Judging by GB Hockey’s recent documentary on their Olympic qualification journey, she has further proved herself as a pivotal leader. In a segment where Pearne-Webb spoke to the group as Hinch recorded her 50th GB cap, her calm and measured qualities shone through as she told Hinch: “You are a leader in how you act and what you say.” It was a buoyant speech for a colossus at the heart of GB’s defence.
Yet, she says she is still learning. “You learn as you go on. No one is ever perfect and as an athlete you always want to get better with goals and targets. Being a captain and leader is exactly the same thing. You self evaulate and I do so even more now.”
During the lockdown phase, she believes that the team, one of the few nations to spend the majority of the working week together, will become an even tighter unit. “At Bisham you are so busy you go through a whole session without speaking to anyone and you don’t take time to have a chat and ask people how they are,” she says.
“Over the past 18 months, we have seen how we have gelled with a young group. This will help us get even closer and time to gel. We made a huge step up in January in our Pro League games and the Olympics postponent can work to our advantage.”
With the GB players readjusting their plans and waiting for the schedule over the coming months when life reaches normality once again, there is one common bond entwined in the group.
“It’s a challenging time, we have the same goal and it’s just about readjusting our plans,” she adds. “I’m not the only one volunteering, loads of girls have in our group. It puts things into perspective. We love sport but there are bigger things out there at the moment.”
My isolation week
Pearne-Webb had been keeping to the same structure as if Tokyo was four months away, just tweaking the volume sessions, having added a turbo bike in her garage.
She borrowed weights from Bisham and undergoes core circuits for bodyweight, with 1 minute exercises, seven seconds off for 10 rounds and the same with hamstrings and ankles. A typical session would last 30 minutes.
She also does single leg squats without weights and purchased bands off the internet for squats and glute exercises.
“The emphasis is on well being,” she says. “It’s all about being healthy and we aren’t at a point where we are pushing performance gains. For me, it’s about getting the circuits done so when we go back to full-time training I will be strong and don’t pick up niggles.
“Then it’s about cleaning out the garage to hit a ball around and kettle bells become little obstacles!”
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The Hockey Paper
England Hockey chief warns of financial dangers if coronavirus continues
By The Hockey Paper 
England Hockey, the seventh-biggest Olympic sport in terms of UK Sport funding, is hopeful that it can refrain from furloughing staff because of the coronavirus outbreak.
Unlike bigger sports such as athletics and cycling which will take up the government’s coronavirus job retention scheme, England Hockey chief executive Nick Pink is “convinced there is enough for staff to be doing” amid the ongoing crisis.
England Hockey (EH) has a 50:50 ratio in terms of on site and remote staff and Pink is wary of placing staff on the scheme due to what he termed as the “moral question” over the national governing body’s public funding.
Last month UK Sport sent a document to Olympic sports in a bid to gauge a financial status and the potential risks to national programmes, where each NGB was also asked to indicate its financial position via a traffic light projection, ranging from green to red.
“We are in the amber stage as we are constantly managing the risk,” said Pink. “We are not in the red category by any stretch and I know number of sports sadly are in that immediate risk.”
With an international summer calendar in the offing, the early decision to cancel the Pro League games until May 17 – meaning that The Stoop double headers would be affected – also saved EH making a loss to the tune of £500,000.
As far as the overall club picture is concerned in England, Pink said it was a “concerning time” and warned: “If we are still in this situation in the next three to six months it does change. For clubs it will become an increasingly dangerous place to be.”
As yet, no national picture has been gleaned in terms of how many of the 860 plus clubs might be financially affected. There are likely to be an array of different scenarios facing clubs, given the largely volunteer aspect, coupled with those who run as a business with clubhouses and outside events, down to clubs who run with no home and play at schools or different venues.
A £20 million commmunity emergency fund has been set up by Sport England, the government’s grass roots quango, and Pink has asked EH’s relationship managers to contact clubs who may be financially strickened.
Pink added: “Sport England have been pretty clear with us and what they want to avoid is sport going under from this. In terms of who is in danger, we are gathering the information and there isn’t an overlay of the [hockey] clubs in the country and therefore what percentage of clubs which will need financial sport.”
Nick gave his first interview to THP affer joining England Hockey in November 2019
With the outdoor season over, clubs are likely to face further predicaments with uncertaintly still over whether many summer leagues can take place.
“This is another income generator and Pink was keen to stress how hockey can learn from other sports such as golf, the sport he used to oversee, in terms of leveraging membership fees before the season kicks into gear.
He said: “We have to keep communicating and talking to people. We can do all we want nationally but at local level every club will be different and there has to be an individual and tailored response.”
Having taken over in the role last November, he added: “One of the challenges I have inherited is that we are an incredibly ambitious sport and organisation and it is about doing things in the right order and this is my opportunity to do that.
“We are open minded about everything and the most important thing we do is to keep supporting and serving the game as much as we can and if we need to make decisions outside of that we will.”
SATURDAY: In the second part of our interview, England Hockey’s chief outlines a vision to be ready for the new season “like never before”.
Help support us in lockdown: Our message to subscribers – and new ones
Help keep independent journalism alive in these uncertain times. Ahead of the new season, please subscribe in print or in digital format.
The Hockey Paper
All is well for Malaysian midfielder Faid on his road to recovery
PETALING JAYA: National hockey midfielder Mohd Faid Farhadh Mohd Shah’s fear of not getting proper rehabilitation for his injuries because of the Coivid-19 pandemic was unfounded.
The 22-year-old has injured his fibula and hamstring before the movement control order (MCO) was imposed on March 18.
Instead of being left in the lurch, Faid has been given an intensive stay-at-home programme by the National Sports Institute (NSI) in Bukit Jalil.
“I was worried that I could not be at 100% when I return to training. However, the team in NSI have given me an exercise schedule to help with my recovery and rehab, ” said Faid, a Sports and Recreation Education student at the Universiti Kebangsaan Malaysia (UKM)
“Right now, I am strengthening my legs due to the fibula injury. I am also doing lots of indoor cycling and core exercise to maintain my fitness level.
“To train indoors, you need to be highly motivated because there would be no one to encourage or watch.
“We can take things easy if we do not have high self-discipline, ” added Faid, who is back with his family in Melaka.
Faid had a brilliant start to 2020 as he helped Universiti Kuala Lumpur (UniKL) to bag their first treble (Charity Shield, Malaysia Hockey League and the TNB Cup) in his first season with the club.
His performances in the league saw him getting a call-up to the national team.
Even though it was a short training stint, Faid said there were immense potential in the team – thanks to the emergence of up and coming players.
“These youngsters, including myself, need lots of intense training to be on par with the experienced senior players.
“We have to strive harder to improve and hopefully qualify for the 2024 Olympics.”
The Star of Malaysia
SoftCo extends support for the Ireland Women’s Hockey Team due to Olympic postponement
SoftCo, the leading global Finance Automation Software provider, today announced the extension of its main sponsorship agreement for the Ireland Women’s Hockey Team. The extension adds a further year to the current agreement ensuring that Hockey Ireland will have funding in place for rescheduled Olympic Games in July 2021 and beyond.
The COVID-19 crisis is a global tragedy and the decision to postpone the Games puts athletes’ welfare first, while protecting the well-being of much wider communities and countries.
Commenting on the announcement, Susan Spence, Co-Founder, SoftCo
“The achievement of the team to reach the Olympics was fantastic and we believe that it is important now that Hockey Ireland have the right funding in place for the Olympics in 2021 and leading into the World Cup in 2022. All of us at SoftCo wish the squad and management well and hope everyone stays safe in these tough times.”
Commenting on the announcement, Sean Dancer, Head Coach of the Irish Women’s team said:
“We really appreciate the continued backing from SoftCo especially during these unprecedented times. Their support and the support of others will allow the Squad to continue to prepare for the Olympics next year.”
Hockey Ireland CEO, Jerome Pels, said:
“SoftCo’s extension of the sponsorship shows a real commitment to support the team on their journey to Tokyo. Today’s announcement helps us with planning for the Games, which have been postponed until 2021 due to COVID-19.”
Irish Hockey Association media release