The fifteenth version of the FIH Hockey Mens World Cup is all set to kickstart in Odisha in simply six days.
With every passing day, the anticipation across the occasion retains rising and it’s just about seen to all people.
The mineral-rich state’s relationship with hockey dates again a number of a long time. Odisha has produced over 100 national-level gamers for the Indian staff, together with Dilip Tirkey, Ignace Tirkey, Lazarus Barla, Jyoti Sunita Kullu, and Sunita Lakra, amongst many others.
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The current Indian males’s and girls’s nationwide squads additionally embody many Odisha gamers, together with Amit Rohidas, Shilanand Lakra, Deep Grace Ekka, Nilam Xess and Namita Toppo.
Over the previous 20 years, the Odisha authorities has additionally actively and closely invested in worldwide hockey, internet hosting varied large-scale multi-nation occasions just like the FIH World Cup, FIH Males’s Junior World Cup, FIH Sequence Finals, FIH World League, FIH Champions Trophy and the FIH Hockey Professional League.
Earlier than the beginning of the mega sporting spectacle, right here’s a have a look at the venues the place the world’s greatest hockey groups will compete for the coveted trophy.
Kalinga Stadium, Bhubaneswar
The Kalinga Stadium is among the two venues for the FIH Males’s World Cup 2023. The stadium will get its title �Kalinga’ from the historic area within the east of India of the identical title, which encompasses the modern-day state of Odisha in entirety, together with components of two different Indian states: Andhra Pradesh and Chhattisgarh.
The Kalinga Hockey Stadium is part of the multi-purpose advanced collectively known as Kalinga Worldwide Stadium, which additionally contains an eight-lane artificial athletics observe, varied high-performance centres, a soccer stadium, an Olympic swimming facility and many extra.
It homes sources for athletics, soccer, hockey, tennis, desk tennis, basketball, volleyball, sport climbing and swimming.
The residents of Bhubaneswar are well-known within the hockey world for the huge numbers they end up in for worldwide hockey matches hosted within the metropolis.
Many gamers from varied hockey-playing nations additionally describe Bhubaneswar as their favourite place to play hockey as a result of ambiance created by the crowds.
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The Kalinga Hockey Stadium has change into a worldwide hub for hockey for practically a decade now. The stadium had hosted its first main worldwide event when it was awarded the internet hosting rights to the Champions Trophy in 2014.
The success of the occasion prompted additional motion, because the 2017 Hockey World League Finals noticed the most effective eight groups on the earth converge in Odisha to play in entrance of a packed viewers. A 12 months later, the Kalinga Stadium took centre stage as soon as once more because the premier males’s hockey event, the FIH Hockey Males’s World Cup, was performed in Bhubaneswar.
Since then, the Kalinga Stadium has been the house of the Indian hockey staff, with not solely the boys’s and girls’s groups coaching within the stadium, however it is usually the place they’ve performed their dwelling matches through the FIH Hockey Professional League.
In 2021, the FIH Males’s Junior World Cup was additionally performed within the Kalinga Stadium.
Birsa Munda Worldwide Hockey Stadium, Rourkela
The Birsa Munda Worldwide Hockey Stadium, in of Rourkela, is among the two venues for the FIH Males’s World Cup 2023.
The stadium is known as after Birsa Munda, a tribal freedom fighter and folks hero who spearheaded the millenarian motion that arose within the Bengal Presidency within the late nineteenth century, making him an vital determine within the historical past of the Independence motion.
Rourkela is among the greatest cities in Odisha, well-known for being dwelling to varied industrial institutions, together with one in all India’s first metal crops.
The town additionally occupies a central place within the Sundargarh district, within the japanese hockey belt of Odisha, which has produced scores of high hockey abilities for India, together with former India skipper Dilip Tirkey, who’s essentially the most capped participant within the historical past of Indian males’s hockey, and at the moment serves because the president of Hockey India.
The goal is for the stadium to supply a much-needed increase to the hockey infrastructure within the district, paving the best way for future stars who can get entry to worldwide commonplace services inside their very own area.
The Birsa Munda Worldwide Hockey Stadium has been constructed on 15 acres of land on the Biju Patnaik College of Know-how campus in Rourkela, which is also known as the “Metal Metropolis of Odisha”.
The stadium will now exchange the Kalinga Hockey Stadium as the most important stadium in Odisha, with a seating capability of 21,000.
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