Olympic gold medallist, Georgie Twigg, hopes the popularity of Women’s Football and Rugby, paired with the promotion of one of Lincoln’s major Hockey clubs, can help encourage young people in Lincolnshire towards Hockey.
After Lindum Hockey Club became the first Lincolnshire team to reach England Hockey’s National League with their Men’s 1st team, LincSport spoke to their most successful alumni, 2016 Rio Olympics Hockey gold medallist Georgie Twigg.
“Firstly, it is a fantastic achievement that the men’s team has done getting promoted. I think that in itself will hopefully attract more players to the club who want to play at that higher level”, Twigg said.
“I think Lindum’s got a great set up now with the new pitch and having the clubhouse there and actually having a base as a Hockey club will definitely help attract new players. It’s definitely a stepping stone and lots of little things need to be chipped away at to get people involved in the sport, to get people involved in any sport.”
Born in Lincolnshire, Twigg began playing Hockey at Lindum, when it was formerly known as Lincoln Hockey Club, and credits the fast, physical and skillful nature of the game as some of main reasons why she fell in love with it.
“I love a team sport firstly, and going through all the highs and lows with your teammates. As well Hockey is such a fast and physical game, but then also really skillful. It had that real thrill factor for me and still when I get some of my male cousins to watch Hockey they can’t believe the speed and skill factor on show”, she added.
The accessibility of sport can be a major hurdle to young people wanting to get involved, an issue that Twigg was keen to raise. She said: “I think it’s really important that we have good clubs, a good grassroots setup in the county, to make it easily accessible. Because any small barriers will just prevent people, if it’s too far a journey, if it’s expensive, if it’s at awkward times it’s just going to put people off and they won’t want to play.”
According to a 2022 Statista survey, Hockey doesn’t even rank in the top 10 of Britain’s favourite sports. It is a game that is often overlooked compared to it’s more popular rivals in Football, or Rugby and Cricket.
So, does Hockey have a fight on it’s hands to attract the next generation of players? Twigg believes so. “No it does. I think its great that Women’s Football and Women’s Rugby is getting more and more into the limelight because I think that will help other women’s sports.
“When we talk about Hockey it’s very much a gender neutral sport, which is great. For any kid I think getting involved in any sport is great. I played all sports when I was younger and it wasn’t until secondary school that I specialised in Hockey. So to a young me, I would say just go out and try lots of different things. You are not going to know what you love and prefer until you’ve tried it.
“I think you can quite easily pigeonhole people into certain brackets and actually you’ve just got to go and try loads of sports. Obviously, I am biased I want people to get out and play Hockey and I think that goes back to my point about making it accessible and making it easy for kids to come along.
“There’s lots of different formats of Hockey now and otherwise it can be quite difficult with all the equipment and the pitch hire. But hopefully clubs like the Lindum are doing the right thing and getting people to come and watch.”
Great to see a lincs team doing so well at last.I played for Normanby Park and we had some great tussles with Lincoln, Brigg, Grimsby and Bourne
Great read, my eldest Alice Trout, loved her hockey and Tony and the later Kaz, was her first coach back in the days when you played at NK school. Team sport is so valuable in many ways, not just on the pitch.
Wishing you all well on your journey.
Jeanette Holden