Field hockey at the Summer Olympics | |
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Governing body | FIH |
Events | 2 (men: 1; women: 1) |
Games | |
|
Hockey, or more specifically, field hockey, was introduced at the Olympic Games as a men's competition at the 1908 Games in London, with six teams, including four from the United Kingdom of Great Britain and Ireland.
Field hockey was removed from the Summer Olympic Games at the 1924 Paris Games because of the lack of an international sporting structure. The International Hockey Federation (FIH, Fédération Internationale de Hockey) was founded in Paris that year as a response to field hockey's omission. Men's field hockey became a permanent feature at the next Olympic Games, the 1928 Games in Amsterdam.
For a long time, India dominated the Olympics, winning the men's gold medal in seven out of eight Olympics from 1928 to 1964. Later, Pakistan was also dominant, winning three gold and three silver medals between 1956 and 1984.
Since 1968, various teams from around the world have seen gold-medal success at the Olympics. Since 1968, several countries in the Southern Hemisphere have won various medals in men's and women's field hockey, including Australia, New Zealand, Argentina, and Zimbabwe. A leading group of teams from the Northern Hemisphere has come from the Netherlands and from Germany.