Field Hockey Trivia
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This field hockey trivia quiz has 55 free questions with answers and covers the whole game, from the pitch markings and the flat side of the stick to the people and teams who made the sport's history. You'll get questions on how many players take the field, what the green, yellow and red cards look like, where the penalty stroke is taken from and why left-handed sticks don't exist, alongside the stories: Dhyan Chand and the Dutch officials who broke his stick looking for a magnet, Roop Singh's ten goals in one Olympic match, the first World Cup that had to move to Barcelona, Luciana Aymar's eight Player of the Year awards and the Kookaburras' long-awaited gold in Athens. It works for a team bus, a club social, a PE class or a pub quiz round, and the mix runs from easy questions any player will know to hard ones on the sport's medieval and Olympic history. Every answer has been checked against the FIH rules as documented on Wikipedia and the relevant player, team and tournament pages, and each explanation adds one detail worth remembering.
30 of 55 questions with answers and explanations. Play the quiz
Q 01A field hockey team puts the same number of players on the pitch as a team in which sport?
Soccer
Soccer. Both field eleven a side, though hockey's rules also let a team drop its goalkeeper and play with eleven field players.
Q 02A field hockey player may play the ball with which part of the stick?
Only the flat face and edges
Only the flat face and edges may play the ball. Using the rounded back is an offence, so to reach a ball on the left a player turns the stick head over.
Q 03In field hockey, which restart has two opponents tap sticks over the ball before playing it?
A bully
A bully. It began every match until 1983, when a pass back took its place; today it only restarts play after stoppages such as injuries.
Q 04Which extra protection may field hockey defenders put on to defend a penalty corner?
A face mask
A face mask. The rules allow it only for safety at such set pieces, and defenders must take it off again as soon as the corner is over.
Q 05Where is the International Hockey Federation headquartered?
Lausanne, Switzerland
Lausanne, Switzerland. The FIH moved there from Brussels, joining the many Olympic sports federations clustered around the IOC's home city.
Q 06Hockey's omission from which Olympic Games prompted the founding of the FIH?
Paris
Paris. Left off the 1924 programme, the sport responded that January when Paul Léautey gathered seven nations there to found the FIH; hockey was back by 1928.
Q 07Field hockey made its Olympic debut, as a men's event, at the Games in which city?
London
London, in 1908. With only two teams coming from abroad, the hosts entered four separate home-nation sides, which took every medal; hockey was then dropped for 1912.
Q 08Which African country won the first women's Olympic hockey tournament, at the boycott-hit 1980 Moscow Games?
Zimbabwe
Zimbabwe. Invited only weeks before the Games to fill a field emptied by the boycott, its scratch squad went unbeaten in one of the great Olympic upsets.
Q 09India's men routed the host nation 8–1 in a 1930s Olympic hockey final in which city?
Berlin
Berlin. Dhyan Chand scored three as India took the third of six straight golds in 1936, part of a run of 30 Olympic wins that ended only in the 1960 final.
Q 10Dhyan Chand's birthday, 29 August, is celebrated in India as what?
National Sports Day
National Sports Day. In 2021 India also renamed its highest sporting honour, the Khel Ratna, after Dhyan Chand.
Q 11Dutch officials are said to have broken open Dhyan Chand's stick to check for what?
A magnet
A magnet. The tale, told in several versions, has Dutch officials so baffled by his close control that they broke his stick open to look for one.
Q 12India's 24–1 Olympic hockey win in the 1930s, with ten goals from Roop Singh, came against which country?
United States
The United States. Only three teams entered in 1932, so the beaten hosts still took bronze, while Roop Singh outscored his famous brother Dhyan Chand by ten goals to eight.
Q 13Who scored five of India's six goals in the 1952 Olympic hockey final?
Balbir Singh Sr.
Q 21Which country's men's field hockey team is nicknamed the Kookaburras?
Australia
Australia. The Kookaburras, named for the laughing kingfisher, medalled at six straight Olympics from 1992 to 2012, yet only one of those medals was gold.
Q 22The Kookaburras ended decades of Olympic near misses by finally winning gold in which city in the 2000s?
Athens
Athens. After losing three Olympic finals, the Kookaburras beat the Dutch 2–1 in 2004 with a sudden-death golden goal from a fumbled penalty corner.
Q 23What job did Hockeyroos coach Ric Charlesworth hold from 1983 to 1993?
Federal member of parliament
Balbir Singh Sr. The 'Sr.' sets him apart from several later Indian internationals named Balbir Singh; his five goals remain the most in an Olympic men's final.
Q 14Which country was the first to win the men's Hockey World Cup four times?
Pakistan
Pakistan. Its fourth title came in 1994, and the trophy itself was made by craftsmen of the Pakistan Army and presented to the FIH in 1971.
Q 15The first men's Hockey World Cup in 1971 was moved for political reasons and played in which city?
Barcelona
Barcelona. Pakistan was due to host, but amid its 1971 political crisis and tension with India the FIH moved the inaugural tournament to the neutral ground of the Real Club de Polo.
Q 16India's men won the 1975 Hockey World Cup in which Southeast Asian capital?
Kuala Lumpur
Kuala Lumpur. Ashok Kumar, son of the great Dhyan Chand, scored the winning goal in the final at the Merdeka Stadium.
Q 17Which women's team had won a record nine Hockey World Cup titles by the end of 2022?
Netherlands
Netherlands. As co-hosts they won a ninth title, and a third in a row, in a final played not at home but in Terrassa, Spain; no other nation had then won more than two.
Q 18'Las Leonas' (The Lionesses) is the nickname of which country's women's field hockey team?
Argentina
Argentina. The players first wore a lioness on their shirts midway through the 2000 Sydney Olympics, went on to take silver, and have been Las Leonas ever since.
Q 19Who was named FIH Player of the Year a record eight times?
Luciana Aymar
Luciana Aymar. She won the 2010 World Cup on home soil in Rosario, in a stadium that now bears her name.
Q 20The dribbling of hockey great 'La Maga', the Magician, drew comparisons with which footballer?
Diego Maradona
Diego Maradona. She was hailed as the Maradona of hockey, even though her home city of Rosario is also the birthplace of Lionel Messi.
Federal member of parliament. Charlesworth held the seat of Perth for Labor while still playing, and won the 1986 World Cup as its top scorer and best player.
Q 24Dutch great Teun de Nooijer wore the number 14 shirt, a number made famous by which footballer?
Johan Cruijff
Johan Cruijff. De Nooijer kept 14 for club and country, and his extra-time goal settled the 1998 World Cup final.
Q 25Which Australian won the FIH Player of the Year award for a fourth time in 2010?
Jamie Dwyer
Jamie Dwyer. He added a fifth award in 2011, having first made his name with the sudden-death goal that won an Olympic final.
Q 26Sohail Abbas, who scored 348 international goals, was known as the king of which shot?
The drag flick
The drag flick. Slung from low behind the body, it counts as a push, so unlike a hit it may be lifted high at goal from a penalty corner.
Q 27Field hockey pioneer Constance Applebee ran athletics for more than two decades at which women's college?
Bryn Mawr
Bryn Mawr. Applebee, who introduced the sport to America at a Harvard summer course in 1901, arrived in 1904, later ran a hockey camp in the Poconos, and lived to 107.
Q 28A field hockey pitch is exactly as long as the distance between the goal lines in which sport?
American football
American football. Both measure 100 yards, because hockey's rules were first written in imperial units, which is why the metric pitch is an odd-looking 91.4 metres long.
Q 29The shooting circle is commonly nicknamed after which letter?
The D
'The D' is the only place a goal can be scored from, which is why so much of the game is about getting the ball in there.
Q 30As of 2025, which university has won the most NCAA Division I field hockey championships?
North Carolina
North Carolina, with 11. The most recent, in 2023, came under 23-year-old rookie coach Erin Matson, who had won four titles as a Tar Heels player.