CM Naveen To Attend Hockey Men’s World Cup Pool Draw Ceremony Today

Bhubaneswar: Setting the ball rolling for the biggest sporting extravaganza of 2023, the International Hockey Federation will today organize the draw ceremony to determine the pools of the upcoming FIH Odisha Hockey Men’s World Cup 2023 Bhubaneswar – Rourkela.

The Ceremony will be held at the Convention Center, Lok Seva Bhawan in Bhubaneswar in the presence of Chief Minister Naveen Patnaik. The FIH Men’s Hockey World Cup is scheduled to be held from 13th to 29th January 2023 in Bhubaneswar and Rourkela.

Sixteen teams including hosts India, Malaysia, Japan, Korea, South Africa, Belgium, England, Germany, Netherlands, Spain, France, Wales, Argentina, Chile, Australia and New Zealand are participating in the biggest event of Hockey.

The draw will be conducted by FIH CEO Thierry Weil, with Chief Minister of Odisha, Naveen Patnaik also in attendance. The four top teams which include host India, Australia, Belgium and Netherlands will be placed on the first row of their corresponding Pools based on the FIH World Rankings as per 1 June 2022.

The Kalinga Hockey Stadium in Bhubaneswar and the brand-new Birsa Munda International Hockey Stadium in Rourkela will host the matches. In the previous edition, in 2018, Belgium claimed the title by winning the final against Netherlands, while Australia wrapped up the podium places, finishing third.

A high level team including officials of the IFH and Hockey India had yesterday visited the Birsa Munda International Hockey Stadium to review the ongoing works. The delegation included International Hockey Federation (FIH) Acting President Seif Ahmed, Chief Executive Officer, Thierry Weil, Hockey India Committee of Administrators, Dr SY Quraishi and Zafar Iqbal. The team expressed its satisfaction with the progress of work and the support extended by Odisha towards the development of Hockey.