The Scottish Women’s Hockey Team made history in March, ending 24 years without a Women’s FIH Hockey World Cup appearance.
The team stepped up in with some heroic performances in qualifiers to grab their moment and Chris Duncan is confident his team will rise to the occasion again in Belgium. Scotland's first group game is against Germany on Saturday 15 August, the Scots will take on the USA on Monday and a tie with Argentina concludes the group on Wednesday.
The wheels were put in motion in for Scotland's history makers in 2022 when Chris Duncan was appointed as National Coach. He immediately started to look at how they could change their style of play, to focus on ball movement and being attack minded. Arriving at the 2026 Women’s FIH Hockey World Cup Qualifiers, in Hydarabad, India, armed with a desire to make history. The team started well, going through their group unbeaten, before being defeated in the semi-finals. However, the squad stayed resolute with knowledge that a place in the World Cup was still in reach if they won the third-place play off.
Amy Costello wrote her name into Scottish hockey record books, scoring the only goal in a 1-0 victory over Italy.
Chris Duncan said: “Representing Scotland on the world stage is a huge honour and something everyone involved is immensely proud of. Qualifying for a World Cup is a testament to the commitment and dedication of the players, staff, and everyone who has supported the programme along the way.
"It's an opportunity to showcase the progress we've made as a team and to inspire the next generation of players back home.
On a personal note, it will be a proud day for me to see the team run out on the 15th August, as a sign of what we have achieved so far, but also a reminder of the potential we possess to continue thriving in the years ahead.”
Chris said: “Everyone is excited to get the tournament underway. The players and staff have worked incredibly hard to get to this point, and now it's about enjoying the opportunity while staying focused on performing to the best of our ability.
"Our goal is to be competitive in every game, stay true to the way we want to play, and make Scotland proud. If we do those things consistently, we'll give ourselves the best chance of achieving positive results.”
sportscotland’s institute of sport has been working closely with the team in the build with physical preparation, performance nutrition, performance psychology, performance lifestyle and coach developer teams helping the squad to be at their best.
One area where sportscotland supported the team in the build-up for the World Cup Qualifiers was to help build a positive mindset.
Chris explained: “There has been some brilliant support from psychology around how we frame things. The work that we do to create our own messaging and our own narrative, developing our ability as a collective group from a cultural perspective.
“So, we worked really hard as a whole staff and as a group of players to take the focus away from qualifying for the World Cup and trying to medal at the tournament. Ultimately you spend a lot of time talking about the next game, and ultimately taking the focus off of what is at the end of the journey.”
One of the reasons why the Women’s National Team have been able to scale new heights is the squad's commitment, often training for 15 hours per week on top of their day-to-day jobs.
Experts from sportscotland have been able to help the players maximise their training time by looking at innovative ways for players to work in the correct preparation to their working days.
Chris added: “Nutrition have been brilliant at providing solutions for players to make sure that they can eat on the go and in the car, between work and the pitch. Physiology have been brilliant at adapting sessions for players who so they can do stuff in their lunch break or before work, and physical preparation similar. They chunk up their gym programme to make it work in an efficient time of a week.”
sportscotland practitioners have also supported Chris throughout his tenure as National Coach, this is through Coach Developer Practitioner, Doug MacDonald, working closely with Chris.
Doug was extremely impressed by Chris’s willingness to work with a Coach Developer, take on feedback and his ability to absorb information. Together, they worked on several different elements, including Doug putting a microphone on Chris and recording him both in training and competitions. Which allowed them to analyse how Chris communicated with both players and staff in various scenarios.
