Hockey: India to host men’s and women’s qualifying playoffs for Tokyo 2020

India’s men’s and women’s hockey teams will be hosting their two-legged Tokyo 2020 Olympic qualifiers in October and November after having missed out on automatic spots at the Asian Games last year.

This will be the final step to make sure India is represented in the quadrennial extravaganza and the two teams had booked their spots for qualifiers earlier this year through their wins at the FIH Series Finals: India’s men beat South Africa in the final in Bhubaneshwar while the women’s team defeated Japan in the title clash in Hiroshima.

The draw to determine the matches of the upcoming FIH Hockey Olympic qualifiers will be held on 9 September at the International Hockey Federation headquarters in Lausanne, Switzerland, the organizing committee confirmed on Thursday.

The FIH Hockey Olympic qualifiers are scheduled for 25-27 October and 1-3 November 2019. The exact match schedule and venues will be confirmed after the draw.

After having earned their places in the final step to Tokyo 2020 through various FIH events, 14 men’s and 14 women’s teams will be involved in this draw.

The FIH Hockey Olympic qualifiers will each feature two nations playing two back-to-back matches, with nations drawn to play each other based on their rankings at the end of the last 2018 / 2019 Continental Championship, namely the Oceania Cup (8 September). The matches will be hosted by the higher-ranked of the two competing nations.

The list of qualified teams for the FIH Hockey Olympic qualifiers, in their current ranking order, is as follows:

(Since either Australia or New Zealand will qualify directly to the Olympic Games as winners of the Oceania Cup, the group of host teams will be reduced to seven teams on 8 September. The ranking order indicated above might change on 8 September depending on the results of the Oceania Cup.)

Men’s Olympic qualifiers:

Host teams:

(1) Australia

(2) Netherlands

(3) India

(4) Germany

(5) Great Britain

(6) Spain

(7) New Zealand

(8) Canada

Away teams:

(9) Malaysia

(10) France

(11) Ireland

(12) Korea

(13) Pakistan

(14) Austria

(15) Egypt

Women’s Olympic qualifiers:

Host teams:

(1) Australia

(2) Germany

(3) Great Britain

(4) Spain

(5) New Zealand

(6) Ireland

(7) India

(8) China

Away teams:

(9) Korea

(10) Belgium

(11) USA

(12) Canada

(13) Italy

(14) Chile

(15) Russia

The draw will be done as follows:

• The teams ranked 1st, 2nd and 3rd will be drawn at random to play at home against one of the teams ranked 12th, 13th or 14th. For example, the team ranked 1st will play at home one of the teams ranked 12th, 13th or 14th, as determined by the draw
• The teams ranked 4th, 5th, 6th and 7th will be drawn at random to play at home against one of the teams ranked 8th, 9th, 10th or 11th

The following teams have already qualified for the Olympic Games Tokyo 2020 as winners of their respective Continental Championship: Argentina (men and women), South Africa (men and women), Belgium (men) and Netherlands (women). They will be joined by the winners of the Oceania Cup – men and qomen - which will take place in Rockhampton, Australia (5-8 September). Japan (men and women) won their Continental Championship in 2018 but were already qualified as hosts.

(With FIH inputs)