The Men's FIH Hockey Nations Cup is an international men's field hockey tournament organised annually by the International Hockey Federation. The tournament serves as the qualification tournament for the Men's FIH Pro League.
The tournament was founded in 2019 and the first edition will
be held in November 2022 in Potchefstroom, South Africa.
Malaysia have always been known for playing a free-flowing attacking style of hockey, but in recent times have stepped it up further, with the team committing to an all-out attacking style that may leave the defence exposed at times, but banks on their ability to score more goals than they let in. In their gold-medal winning campaign at the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup 2022, which remains their last major honour! And recently finished 4th in the 2024 Sultan Azlan Shah Cup.
Malaysia came into the previous edition of the Nations Cup as
one of the favorites and made it to the semi-finals, but lost to eventual
champions South Africa and finished 4th place.
Malaysia had a disappointing Men’s World Cup in 2023,
finishing in 13th place and 6th placing in the 2023 Asian Games, but
were a much-improved outfit at the FIH Olympic Hockey Qualifiers in Oman
earlier this year. They missed out on a semi-final place and Olympic
Qualification, but made the most of the positional playoff matches, beating
Chile and Canada to finish in 5th place.
Let’s discuss about the event:
ABOUT THE
EVENT
Event title
FIH Hockey Men’s Nations Cup Poland 2023/24
When 31 May -
9 June 2024
Where Hockey
Stadium, Gniezno, Poland
TEAMS
Pool A - Austria,
Korea, New Zealand, Poland, South Africa
Pool B - Canada,
France, Malaysia, Pakistan
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EVENT WEBSITE
nationscup.hockey
BROADCAST AND
LIVE STREAMING
All matches
from the FIH Hockey Men’s Nations Cup Poland 2023-24 will be streamed live (and
available on-demand) on the Watch.Hockey* app. *except on the Indian
subcontinent.
The FIH
Hockey Nations Cup is an annual tournament that involves some of the best
hockey playing nations of the world and acts as a pathway to the FIH Hockey Pro
League, with the first placed team in the FIH Hockey Nations Cup getting the
opportunity to replace the bottom placed team in the FIH Hockey Pro League in
the subsequent year.
The FIH
Hockey Nations Cup features the best eight teams* (by world rankings) that are
not a part of the FIH Hockey Pro League, in both men’s and women’s
competitions. The eight teams are split into two pools of four teams each, with
the top two teams in each pool proceeding to the semi-finals, while the bottom
two teams from each pool will play for 5-8 place classification.
*Since, on
the basis of the FIH World Rankings, the Polish team had not qualified for this
FIH Hockey Nations Cup, the tournament will exceptionally be played with 9
teams.
The FIH Hockey Men’s Nations Cup will run from 31 May to 9 June 2024 in Gniezno, Poland, whilst the FIH Hockey Women’s Nations Cup will start on 3 June and finish also on 9 June in Terrassa, Spain where Malaysian Women didn’t qualify to play.
The opening match against Pakistan will be the key decider whether we will cross the line for a seat to SF. Canada is a very weak side and low in standard and FRANCE will top the group B as this France team is well prepared and hosting the Olympics and all rounder strength under Fed Soyez.
Malaysia should at least make the Semifinals and to match top 4 finish and if any lower than that there will be a massive impact on world rankings and currently the team is undergoing a rebuilding phase towards the new cycle - 2026 Asian Games and 2028 LA Olympics. There are many facets that still need to be improved and the gap is still wide between the best teams in the world hockey.
Pool A is the group of death - NZ will be with their 7 key players who missed the Sultan Azlan Shah Cup - Hayward, Wood, Sam Lane, Hugo, Kane, Aidan and others. South Africa will be another great team and Korea is going thru massive reboot phase and Austria will be a dark horse and Poland is more of participation level. From Pool A - NZ & SA will qualify to SF. Pool B will be France as top and another slot between Malaysia & Pakistan. Pakistan currently based in Holland and playing strong matches and their objective is to win the Nation Cup and qualify for FIH Pro League season 6.
My TOP 4 predictions:
NEW ZEALAND
FRANCE
SOUTH AFRICA
PAKISTAN
Wishing the Malaysian hockey team the very best and Godspeed....
Will be watching the tournament and will provide updates on the tactical and technical aspects of the Malaysian team...
MANINDERJIT SINGH (MIKE)
FORMER INTERNATIONAL & SEC GEN OF MHC
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Now dismantle the teams and select the new players will not bring any significant result in the major tournaments, the current Junior League (1997) and Senior MHL been organised by MHC since 1987, why shortage of players for national teams, it shows the national leagues itself was failures. This kind situation never arise in 90's.Next 20 or 30 ys. If it continues with this kind of development team will remain current level there won't further improvenmrnt and also in decline stage. All the states should run competition like MHC for state development but how many doing it.
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