Although most people associate hockey primarily with ice and puck, playing with sticks and balls in a grassy meadow is entertainment with a much longer history. In Europe in recent centuries, this game was, perhaps, only popular in England, but this turned out to be quite enough for its inclusion in the program of the summer games soon after the revival of the Olympic movement.
Field hockey first appeared at the IV Summer Olympics in London. It was in 1908, but that competition in the full sense of the word cannot be called a tournament of national teams - four British teams, the winning club of the German championship and a team from France took part in it. Four British participants were then placed at the top of the final table. The next time grass hockey was included in the Olympic program 8 years later, and regularly began to be present in it eight years later, starting with the 1928 Summer Olympics in Amsterdam.
In the old world, this sport began to gain popularity since the middle of the last century, and regular European championships began to be held only in 1971. In India and Pakistan, this game was much better developed, which explains the dominance of the two Asian countries in the Olympic tournaments until 1988. From IX to XXIII Olympiads, Indian hockey players received gold medals 8 times, silver medals once and bronze medals twice. During this period, Pakistanis received three sets of gold and bronze medals and took third place once.
Since 1976, field hockey matches have been increasingly held not on a grassy meadow, but on artificial turf courts. This factor gave an additional impetus to the development of the sport in many countries and gradually nullified the advantage of India and Pakistan. Since 1988, German teams have become champions three times, Dutch teams have won twice, Australia, New Zealand and England have won once.
The women's tournament has been held at the Olympics since 1980, and the first Olympic title was won by the national team of Zimbabwe. In the same year, the men's and women's national teams of the USSR were able to get to the medals for the only time - both won bronze medals. There are no awards in field hockey in the history of Russian Olympians.
