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    #26
    There's a thing called the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup on the BBC; I'm watching England v Malaysia on iPlayer from earlier today.

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      #27
      Being used as a bit of a warm up for the Commonwealths, isn't it?

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        #28
        Good crowds in Malaysia btw, to answer a question from seven and a half years ago.

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          #29
          Originally posted by Ray de Galles View Post
          Being used as a bit of a warm up for the Commonwealths, isn't it?
          Ah, that makes sense!

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            #30
            Quite the thumping, 7-2, and the final is on BBC sport at 12:30 tomorrow where England will face Australia.

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              #31
              Which England lost. I don't pretend to understand hockey tactics, so I won't draw attention to England's annoying habit of passing backwards at least six times before starting an attack.

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                #32
                Have dug through for the Davis/Fed Cup, I've came upon this which was last discussed during my self imposed hiatus for all things but X11.

                The explanation of Hockey tactics is that the ball can move faster than a player, much faster in fact. England's tactics of switching it around the back are completely standard. What they are trying to achieve is the following i) Keep doing in until they catch the opposition out in shuffling across (or wear them out), then press down the weak side and check whether the oppo send their players on a sprint to cover this thrust. If they don't, attack down that channel. If they do, recycle and switch sides one more time as the opposite flank will now be heavily undermanned and a good attacking opportunity. A key phrase in Hockey coaching is "ball speed". This needs to be sufficiently high to make teams make decision on their lateral defence.

                Having recently started playing five-a-side Football after years of playing Hockey, what struck me was how much more direct Football was. But then, that makes sense. Hockey players are armed with a stick a little over 1m long. That increased the effective area they can prevent attacks through correspondingly. Given that Hockey is also 11-a-side and is played on a marginally smaller pitch than Football, it makes it significantly more difficult to expose a Hockey side that are out of position. Hence the greater patience and need for a much bigger hole before a team will risk trying to attack it.

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                  #33
                  The Women's Hockey World Cup starts in London in 10 days' time. (The men's is in November in Odisha, eastern India.)

                  Schedule here: https://www.bbc.co.uk/sport/hockey/44645085

                  There are some tickets still available but not for England games.

                  Wales and Scotland didn't qualify but Ireland did - they play under a flag of the four provinces.




                  The bad news? TV coverage is not on free-to-air, but BT Sport instead. That won't be helping participation much.
                  http://sport.bt.com/more-sport-hub/m...11364184333349

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                    #34
                    The BBC are streaming in on the red button and the website. BT Sport cover Hockey regularly, so those who follow the game will know where to find it. Which doesn't generate new interest or promote the sport as much as free-to-air, for sure, but the Hockey world is pretty healthy at the moment in England at least.

                    I'm currently in the process of putting a group together to go to one of the sessions, so can everyone else hang fire on the ticket buying until this is sorted, please? Ta.

                    One oddity to note is the cross-over games between the Groups and QFs. The tournament has quite a sensible looking structure to those coming from a Football background, four pools of four teams, but rather than the top two of each group going through to the QFs it's just the top team who advance all the way, with the 2nd placed teams playing off with those finishing 3rd for the other four QF places. This has the effect of making basically every pool game a live rubber.
                    Last edited by Janik; 11-07-2018, 13:04.

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                      #35
                      Cheers Janik, that's a relief about some online BBC coverage.

                      Agreed the state of English hockey seems pretty good at the moment regardless - there's always a decent boost from the Olympics and the club at Ely seems very vibrant these days. If my Tuesday evenings were a bit freer I'd probably go to the training sessions there myself, relive my glory days from uni... anyway...

                      I like those playoff games - would have led to some interesting matches at the FIFA world cup - though they seem likely to lead to the QFs being rematches from the group stage again?

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                        #36
                        Originally posted by Kevin S View Post
                        the club at Ely seems very vibrant these days. If my Tuesday evenings were a bit freer I'd probably go to the training sessions there myself, relive my glory days from uni...
                        Actually from the perspective of a rival club, the adult portion of Ely City HC seems to be struggling. They lost a Men's team recently and have seen their other sides slip down the leagues, particularly on the Men's side. This may be due to an issue they have, or had, with their pitch which has simply become too old so it doesn't drain properly and therefore floods and accumulates mud. They need to get it relaid, indeed there was a rumour that the East League had told them they could use it last season on the understanding that it had to be replaced this summer, but whether this is accurate and it has happened or not is another question. Relaying an astro is a costly operation, particularly for an amateur sports club. They could do with all the new enthusiastic members they can get to rebuild numbers and strength in depth...

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                          #37
                          I'll think about it... Didn't know they'd lost a team - I had seen the pitch fund appeal though - they raised nearly £2000 from hosting a mini tournament over the summer but I suspect that's a drop in the ocean of the cost of relaying a pitch.

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                            #38
                            So the opening games of the Women's World Cup are tomorrow. The Guardian is trying to trail it with an article given a headline suggesting the mansplainin' idea that the England Women's Hockey team (Euro champs in 2015 and lots of overlap with the Olympic gold medals winners of 2016) have been taking advice from the manager of the Men's Football team (nothing of significance in decades). When you actually read the article it seems more like a two-way process tipped towards the Hockey players and coaches passing on tips to the Footballers, with Southgate interested in hearing what worked in Rio.

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                              #39
                              Watching the opening game as the two teams involved, Germany and South Africa, will be playing again next Saturday when I've got tickets (it's been all Germany and they are unlucky to only be 1-0 up after the first quarter). The main initial observation is they have install a very large temporary stand down one side of the pitch. I didn't think Lee Valley held anything like 10,000 in its usual configuration.

                              England-India is a 2pm start for anyone interested in watching. BT Sport and radio but not TV coverage via the BBC website/5Live Sports Extra.
                              Last edited by Janik; 21-07-2018, 11:28.

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                                #40
                                England drew 1-1 with India which is no.2 in the world being held by no.10, and in the same group Ireland (16) upset USA (7) 3-1.

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                                  #41
                                  I think that extra large stand was added after initial sales went so well, especially for the England matches, and is a demonstration of a post-Rio surge in interest.

                                  I’m hoping to pop down one evening and see some random games (with Wales not qualifying) as I’ve always enjoyed live hockey before.

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                                    #42
                                    I notice there are still tickets available for next Tuesday’s crossover matches which will feature England if they don’t top the group. I presume that is more of a possibility (if still not likely) with their result yesterday? I might take the risk of getting some tickets for my children if so.

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                                      #43
                                      It's possible, but at a guess yesterday's result made it less likely rather than more. The USA were the nominal second seeds in the group, and they lost to the bottom ones, Ireland. That made England's dropped points against India less significant. The chances are they won't be as nervous and inefficient again (30+ circle penetrations and ~10 penalty corners ought to add to up way more than one goal).

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                                        #44
                                        Originally posted by Janik View Post
                                        So the opening games of the Women's World Cup are tomorrow. The Guardian is trying to trail it with an article given a headline suggesting the mansplainin' idea that the England Women's Hockey team (Euro champs in 2015 and lots of overlap with the Olympic gold medals winners of 2016) have been taking advice from the manager of the Men's Football team (nothing of significance in decades). When you actually read the article it seems more like a two-way process tipped towards the Hockey players and coaches passing on tips to the Footballers, with Southgate interested in hearing what worked in Rio.
                                        This interview with horrendous turncoat Martyn Margetson reveals one way in which the English football team has taken from the GB hockey side.

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                                          #45
                                          I go past that temporary stand every few days. It’s enormous.

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                                            #46
                                            Quite fancy going but the tickets don’t look exactly cheap.

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                                              #47
                                              There were some pretty cheap tickets going for non-England sessions, £20 adult and £5 children for tomorrow night’s matches it seems, for instance.
                                              Last edited by Ray de Galles; 23-07-2018, 22:42.

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                                                #48
                                                There won't be a bad view in the house, as it's still 10,000 capacity stadium. The big stand apparently holds 5,000 of those. So cat B or C should be OK. There are some of those available for the Friday evening session (first match is a 6pm start) and Sunday afternoon one (11am) priced at £10 adults / £1 U18s on the Friday and £15 / £1 on Sunday. Which doesn't seem that bad for two games of elite sport that will include the World No.1 team and tournament favourites (Netherlands).
                                                Friday - https://hockeyworldcup.seetickets.co...london/1083079
                                                Sunday - https://hockeyworldcup.seetickets.co...london/1083082

                                                As Ray notes, tickets are also available for the crossover matches that would feature England if they don't top their pool (or indeed finish bottom of it!). No cat C for those but cat B are £21 / £5, which still feels pretty reasonable. After Ireland's win against the US in their first game it's highly likely that they will be playing in that session if England are not.

                                                I'm going this Saturday afternoon to see Spain vs Germany and Argentina vs South Africa. That includes three relatively recent Olympic champions. My seat cost me £30 and others at that price are still available...

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                                                  #49
                                                  Originally posted by Ray de Galles View Post
                                                  There were some pretty cheap tickets going for non-England sessions, £20 adult and £5 children for tomorrow night’s matches it seems, for,instance.
                                                  Australia vs Belgium should be a good game, an all... and Japan gave the Aussie a real test in their opener so made be able to take the Black Sticks (i.e. New Zealand).

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                                                    #50
                                                    Still gutted there's nothing on the BBC. They have about 90 seconds of highlights of the England game, though there are 3-minute videos or thereabouts on the FIH YouTube channel.

                                                    https://www.youtube.com/user/fihockey

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