Sports and Youth Services Secretary Vishal Dev said that Bhubaneswar is all set to host one of the three Hockey Series Finals to be held from June 6 to 16 next year.
The Hockey Series would be open to the national teams, those are not playing in the Hockey Pro League, Dev said. Sports and Youth Services Minister Chandra Sarathi Behera and International Hockey Federation (FIH) president Narinder Batra and other senior officials of FIH were present.
With the successful hosting of Odisha Hockey Men’s World Cup, Bhubaneswar will once again welcome international hockey when it will host the Hockey Series Finals, Minister Behera said.
The Hockey Series takes place in two rounds, the Open and the Finals.
The nine highest ranked teams in the FIH World Rankings skip the Open and advance directly to the Finals.
All other national teams play in the Hockey Series Open, which features eight regional events with up to six teams each.
Fifteen teams will qualify from the Hockey Series Open to the Hockey Series Finals, for a total of 24 teams in the Finals.
Those teams will play in three events, with eight teams per event, said sources. The top II teams in each of the final events will qualify for the Olympic Qualification Events.
In this qualification event, they will be joined by the top four placed teams from the Pro League, and the four highest-ranked teams not already qualified.
The teams will be drawn and they will play a two-legged tie to determine seven qualified nations for the 2020 Tokyo Olympic Games.
While India will host the second of the Hockey Series Finals, Kuala Lumpur would host the first event from April 23 to May 1.
The Final Hockey Series would be hosted by Le Touquet, France from June 15 to 23, said sources in FIH.