Warm Greetings to all my ardent readers and hockey supporters in Malaysia and the rest of the world. Been busy involved with Astro broadcasting team for the recent FIH Nation Cup in Kuala Lumpur and hope everyone enjoyed our insights and analysis on the tournament. It was well organized and well done to those involved.
There was a lot of confusion and explanation
about the Road to Men’s Hockey World Cup 2026, therefore, I have decided to pen down
the detail understanding of the processes and also provided some assumptions
on the probable teams and their chances.
Let’s start…..
The 2026 Men's FIH Hockey World Cup will be the
16th edition of the Men's FIH Hockey World Cup, the quadrennial world
championship for men's national field hockey teams organized by the
International Hockey Federation. It will be held from 14 to 30 August 2026 in
Wavre, Belgium and Amstelveen, Netherlands.
The Malaysian Women Team would not have any
chance to qualify - even at FIH Nation Cup 2 (Tier 3 International event after
Pro League & Nation Cup 1) in Poland, we managed to secure 7th
place out of 8 teams – generally we may play in the Qualifiers and to make it, the chances are very very very slim….Thats the reality.
Let’s discuss about the Malaysian Men’s Hockey –
Road to World Cup 2026. Many hockey fans and stakeholders with former
international has spoken and provided solutions of the current predicaments of
Malaysian Hockey Team. Some are good and some are bad, some are happy and some
are not happy. Ok keep this discussion away and let’s zoom in to the Road to
2026 FIH World Cup – crucial 7 months.
If it’s a 12 Teams as many years ago – Malaysia
Hockey can say Goodbye and we must say thanks to FIH for expanding the number
of teams – 16 Teams since last 3 World Cups since 2018. Our results we finished
second last in all 3 editions 2014, 2018 and 2023 FIH World Cup. Best Finish in
1975 no 4 and in 2002 no 8. These are the 2 best positions achieved in the last
15 World Cups editions.
The Breakdown of the 16 Teams, see below the
image for the explanation:
2 Pro League - Australia & one
more by 30th June – most probably Germany will take this slot.
5 Continental Championship
7 via World Cup Qualifiers.
There will be 2 doors to 2026 World Cup – win the Asia Cup in Rajbir, India August/September – India will win it to seal their spot and others like Pakistan, Korea has improved well.
We will end up playing the Qualifiers in World
Cup – lets understand this door better as this is very crucial.
Teams Qualified via the FIH Hockey Men’s World Cup Qualification Tournaments 7 quotas. There will be 2 (two) FIH Hockey World Cup Qualification Tournaments, consisting of eight (8) teams each (16 teams in total), held in early 2026. The tournament format will be as follows:
• Two (2) pools of four (4) teams each;
• Semi-Final will be played by the top two (2)
teams from each pool;
• Team not qualified to the semi-finals will
play classification matches from 5-8
• Winners of the Semi-Finals are qualified to
the FIH Hockey Men’s World Cup 2026
• Winners of the Bronze medal matches are
qualified to the FIH Hockey Men’s World Cup 2026
• The highest World Ranked team (at midnight on
the final day of the qualification tournaments) that finishes in 4th place in
each Event will be also qualified to the FIH Hockey Men’s World Cup 2026.
The teams invited to participate in these FIH
Qualification Tournaments will be based on continental quotas, determined by
the number of nations from each continent who are World Ranked in the top 25
eligible nations on 31 January 2025.
From these 25 quotas, the continents
of the nine (9) nations already qualified (the 2 hosts, the 2 FIH Pro League
Qualified Teams and 1 from each of the 5 Continental Championships) will be
removed, leaving 16 continental quotas. These 16 continental quotas will be
filled by the highest finishing nations in each continental championship who
have not already qualified for the FIH Hockey Men’s World Cup 2026. Based on
the FIH World Rankings on 31 January, 2026.
Let’s workout the Assumptions:
Direct Slots:
Netherland, Belgium, Australia &
Germany (TBC via Pro League)
India-Asia, Argentina-Pan Am, New
Zealand – Oceania, S Africa – African & England – European
The balance 16 Teams for World Cup Qualifiers will be:
Spain, France, Ireland, Malaysia,
Korea, Pakistan, Japan, China, Wales, Chile, Canada, Austria, Scotland, Poland,
United States, Egypt – these teams will put in ranking order – on 1st
February 2026.
How the Seeding between the above 16 teams into 2 venue of 8 Teams:
The snake system will be used to allocate the 16 nations into the two FIH World Cup Qualification Tournaments, as shown below.
Snake system
Ranking order of 16 teams in the FIH
World Cup Qualification Tournaments
Tournament A 1, 4, 5, 8, 9, 12, 13,
16
Tournament B 2, 3, 6, 7, 10, 11, 14,
15
Note: If the 2 hosts are allocated by the snake system to participate in the same tournament, then the lower ranked of the two hosts will be swapped into the other tournament with the equivalent ranked team allocated to the other tournament.
From these 16 teams – the best seven (7) that has a chance to qualify are:
6 slots - France, Spain, Ireland,
Pakistan, Korea, Malaysia – other slots will be from Wales, Chile, China, Canada
& Scotland are the 2nd best teams that could be the spoilers and
steal slots. The rest is more of participations & exposure level.
Let’s see the next 7 Months after finishing 6th out of 8 at the FIH Nation Cup in KL recently – first will be the Asia Cup in Rajbir - 27 August to 7 September 2025.
Wishing the Men’s Malaysian Hockey Team, the very best and good luck in your preparation….
MANINDERJIT SINGH (MIKE)
Former Malaysian Hockey International - 1990-2002
Former Secretary General of Malaysian Hockey Confederation & Member of FIH "Think Tank" 2009-2012
In Europe, hockey is gaining popularity among youths compared to Asia, with the exception of India.
ReplyDeleteMalaysia has no active clubs. And the attrition rate among youth hockey players is extremely high.
It's only a matter of time before European countries like Wales, Scotland, and Austria drive the Speedy Tigers out of mainstream hockey.
Thank you, Mike, for a well-elaborated article.