Great Britain forward Rob Moore is entering his third Olympic campaign, but much has changed since his Games debut in Athens, 2004.
There is the buzz of a home Games of course, but it is the transformation of the GB side from a steady mid-ranking unit into one that can play the attacking hockey to match the best sides in the world that excites the 31-year-old.
“It’s a really exciting team to play in we’ll definitely be able to come out of the other side of it and say we gave it everything we could to win a gold, which is what we all want to do. So that’s a great feeling to have,” Moore said.
“If you go back five years we didn’t have the ability to play this type of hockey. Now we have world class players, and we have real depth in the group that means we can play a higher level of hockey.
“Being a home games has brought added excitement and anticipation. We’ve had more coverage of us than we have ever had before as a sport. That intensifies everything before a tournament – the nerves, the excitement, the anticipation.
“But we have been preparing this for a long time and we’ve known it’s coming and we feel we are ready to go out there and give it a really good shot – which is a really good feeling.
Great Britain open their Olympic Games campaign at the Riverbank Arena against Argentina on Monday (July 30) at 7pm. Having finished ninth in Athens and fifth in Beijing, Moore says this time the GB hockey side is in the medal hunt.
“To be able to play a brand of hockey that you know, if you do it well, you are going to be there, that’s a really exciting thing to be able to do,” said Moore, a veteran of 84 games for GB and 148 for England.
“We are playing to the strengths of our players, but everyone is comfortable with what they are good at and what they have to go out and do. Some people will be much more penetrative and attacking than others but it’s all based around that framework of going out there and trying to do it and take it on.”
