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The short answer
Review field hockey in five buckets: penalty corners at both ends, the press, the outlet from the back, circle entries, and defending the circle. Six to ten clips per match, plus every penalty corner, is enough.
Film from as high as you can get on the halfway line, wide enough to hold both 23-metre areas when play is in midfield. If you have a second phone, put it high behind one goal: an end-on angle is the best way to see a penalty corner.
Why hockey rewards film
This is about field hockey, the eleven-a-side game played on turf that most of the world simply calls hockey. If you coach on ice, our post on ice hockey video analysis is the one you want.
Hockey is hard to read from the sideline for a simple reason: the ball is small and it moves fast, so the eye follows it and nothing else. A defender stepping out of the press a second early, a forward drifting out of the passing lane, the gap at the top of the circle — all of it is happening away from the ball, and all of it is plain on a wide shot played back at half speed.
The game also gives you a set piece that repeats. A match usually produces a handful of penalty corners at each end, each one a rehearsed routine against a rehearsed defence, and the difference between a goal and a cleared ball is often a tenth of a second at the trap or a yard in the first runner’s line. That is exactly the kind of detail film shows and memory does not.
The five things worth clipping
1. Penalty corners, both ends
Clip every one, attacking and defending. They are the most structured moments in the game, they decide a large share of close matches, and a season’s worth of them builds into a real sample quickly. The next section breaks one down.
2. The press
Whether you press high from the opposition’s back line or sit in a half-court press, clip the moments it worked and the moments it broke. The usual story is the same as in football: the trigger was there, most of the team went, and one player didn’t, which opened the lane the whole press was meant to close.
Pause the frame the moment the opposition breaks through and look at the distances. A press that is stretched across the width of the pitch leaves a pass through the middle; one that is too compact leaves the far side open for an aerial.
3. The outlet from the back
The other side of the same coin. Clip every time your defence tried to play out under pressure, especially from free hits in your own 23. Did the back line give the ball carrier a pass to make? Did a midfielder show for it, or stand marked? Was the self-pass taken quickly, or did the restart wait while the press reset?
Turnovers in your own half are the most expensive in the game, and most of them are positional. You can usually see the cause before the ball is played.
4. Circle entries
Count them, then clip what happened next. Getting into the circle is only half the job; the question is whether the entry led to a shot, a corner, or a ball run into a crowd and lost. Watch where your forwards are when the ball arrives: on the post for a deflection, at the top for the pass back, or all in a line chasing it.
5. Defending the circle
Clip every shot and every corner you conceded, and start the clip five seconds earlier than the event. Defending the circle is mostly about body position and patience: channelling the attacker onto their reverse stick, staying on the feet instead of diving in, and keeping the ball off your own feet, since a foot in the circle gives away a corner. A wide shot shows who committed early.
If your competition settles draws with shootouts, clip every attempt at both ends too. Keepers in particular learn a lot from seeing which way they committed and when.
Breaking down a penalty corner
A penalty corner lasts a few seconds and has several people doing one job each. Review it in the order it happens, and watch one role at a time rather than the whole picture at once.
| Stage | In attack | In defence |
|---|---|---|
| Injection | Speed and accuracy to the stopper; a slow injection gives the runners a yard | First runner’s start: on the push, not after it |
| Trap | Clean stop just outside the circle, in the same spot every time | How far the first runner has got by the time the ball is stopped |
| Shot | Drag flick, slap or hit, and the time from injection to shot | The runner’s line: at the stick, not at the ball; the keeper’s set position |
| Variation | Whether a slip or a deflection at the post looked different from the straight shot | Whether the post and line defenders held their jobs or all went to the ball |
| Second phase | Who was there for the rebound | Who cleared it, and whether the clearance went wide or back into the circle |
The time from injection to shot is the most useful single number on attack. Every tenth of a second is most of a metre of the first runner’s run, and you can time it from footage with nothing more than the pause button.
Junior and club competitions often have their own rules on penalty corners, for example on how high the first shot can be. Review against what your league actually allows, not what you see on television.
The end-on angle earns its keep here. From behind the goal you can see the runner’s line, the gap between the post defenders and the keeper, and whether the flick went where it was meant to. From the halfway line the whole thing is a cluster of bodies at the top of the circle.
Clip the cause, not the goal
The starter tags ClipItCoach gives a field hockey team are outcomes and stoppages: goal, shot on goal, penalty corner, penalty stroke, and the green, yellow and red cards. They are useful for finding moments quickly, and Penalty corner in particular is worth pressing every time one is awarded. But a goal is the end of the story, and the coaching point is usually the turnover or the missed press three passes earlier.
Add a handful of tags for what you actually coach, like Press, Outlet, Circle entry and 23 restart, and set them to start a few seconds before you press the key, so every clip already holds the build-up. Our guide to clipping a game with tags shows how.
Then send clips to the people they are about. Groups for your defenders, midfield and forwards mean the back line gets the outlet clips and the forwards get the circle entries. Because hockey substitutions roll, the unit on the pitch changes all match, and short clips sent to the right group land better than a whole-squad reel. See the twenty-minute film session for how to run the session itself.
Draw the lane, not the player
The most useful drawing in hockey is usually a line on the turf: the passing lane the press left open, the outlet that was on, the line the first runner should have taken at a corner. Pause on the frame, draw it, and the point makes itself. See what telestration is for the tools.
On AI tracking: ClipItCoach’s AI player tracking covers football, basketball and rugby. For field hockey, drawing on a freeze frame is the dependable tool, and it works on any footage.
Filming field hockey
- Position: the halfway line, as high as you can get. Many hockey pitches have no stand, so a clubhouse balcony, a scaffold tower or a telescopic pole is worth the effort. Height is what separates players in a crowded circle.
- Frame: wide enough to hold the press and the space behind it. When play is in midfield, both 23-metre lines should be in shot. Follow play with a slow pan rather than zooming in on the ball.
- Penalty corners: don’t pan away while the corner is being set up. The positions before the injection are half the information.
- A second angle: a phone high behind one goal catches every penalty corner at that end. Teams swap ends at half-time, so it records your attacking corners in one half and your defending corners in the other.
- Floodlights: turf pitches under lights are darker and less even than they look, and a small, fast ball blurs easily. If your camera allows it, raise the shutter speed and accept a darker picture. On a watered pitch, watch for glare off the surface and angle the camera away from the brightest lights.
Our guide to filming your own games covers tripods, phones and settings.
What to count across a season
A few simple counts, kept every match, tell you more than any amount of unstructured watching.
| Count | What it tells you |
|---|---|
| Circle entries, both ways | How often each team gets the ball where goals come from |
| Shots or corners per circle entry | Whether your entries are quality or forced |
| Penalty corner conversion, both ends | Often the difference between two evenly matched teams |
| Corners conceded, by cause | Feet, tackles in the circle or the ball played over your own back line |
| Turnovers in your own half | Whether the outlet works under pressure |
| Goals conceded while a player down | What cards are really costing you |
Penalty corner conversion at both ends is the one to start with if you only keep one. It is easy to count, it reflects hours of training at both ends, and it tracks closely with the result in tight matches.
Common questions
What should a field hockey coach clip from a match?
Every penalty corner at both ends, the press and the moments it broke, the outlet from your own 23 under pressure, circle entries and what followed them, and every shot or corner you conceded. Six to ten clips beyond the corners is enough. Start each clip at the cause, which is usually a turnover or a missed press several passes before the goal.
How do you analyse penalty corners on video?
Review each one in order: the injection, the trap, the shot, any variation, and the second phase. Watch one role at a time. On attack, time the injection to the shot; on defence, watch the first runner’s start and line and whether the post defenders held their jobs. An end-on angle from behind the goal shows far more than the halfway line.
Where should you film a field hockey match from?
From the halfway line, as high as you can get, wide enough to hold both 23-metre lines when play is in midfield. A clubhouse balcony, scaffold tower or telescopic pole helps where there is no stand. If you have a second phone, put it high behind one goal to catch penalty corners end-on.
What field hockey statistics are worth tracking from video?
Circle entries at both ends, shots or corners per circle entry, penalty corner conversion at both ends, corners conceded by cause, turnovers in your own half and goals conceded while a player down. Penalty corner conversion is the most useful single number, since it tracks closely with the result in tight matches.
Does AI player tracking work for field hockey?
ClipItCoach’s AI player tracking covers football, basketball and rugby, not field hockey. For hockey, drawing on a freeze frame is the dependable tool: mark the passing lane the press left open, the outlet that was on, or the line the first runner should have taken at a corner.