Dhyan Chand stadium to host opener

Apart from Delhi, the orgainsers of the event have identified nine venues -– Mumbai, Pune, Jalandhar, Hyderabad, Chennai and Bangalore among others -– to be shared by the eight participating teams.

“The opening match will be played in Delhi’s National Stadium. Before the game, there will be a gala opening ceremony where some big names of Bollywood and music industry will perform,” Tournament Director Dennis Meredith said during a conference here last night. There will be three matches next day and thereafter there will be a double header every day. The final will be a best of three contest,” he added.

Meredith also said the technical committee of WSH which met here yesterday, decided to have a few variations in the rules and regulations but primarily the event will witness traditional hockey. Keeping in mind the workload of players, all the teams will have 25 registered players in the event, jointly promoted by Nimbus Sport and Indian Hockey Federation.

All the matches in WSH will be of 70 minutes, but instead of two halves, the games will have four quarters of 17-and-a-half minutes each. Among other rules, there will be green and yellow cards for on-field offences, video umpires in all games, and one-on-one shoot-outs in semifinals and final in case the regulation and extra time fails to produce a result.