Within a year and a half San Fernando will have a hockey pitch with synthetic turf on water, one of the few in Andalucía. This therefore fulfils the promises made to the city’s historical hockey club which was one of the sport’s pioneers and has been in existence for 30 years.

They will be installations with an international appeal for, as Emilio Hurtado the president of San Fernando’s Hockey Club explains, “the Northern European teams can train here in the winter”. Veterans from countries where hockey is very popular, such as Germany, England, Italy and Holland, have used the installations in the past. But not only veterans come “students here learning Spanish also come to practice their favourite sport”.

The new ground will be one of the few that exist at this level in Andalucía, and will undoubtedly serve as an incentive and help promote the sport in the city as well as attracting sports tourism to the area.

Field and indoor hockey have been played in San Fernando since 1969. At present they are played outdoors on synthetic turf laid on sand and inside in the sports hall.

The club has twenty mini-hockey teams at beginners and junior levels. Both male and female teams play in the first division and have players with sports scholarship from Madrid’s “Centro de Alto Rendimiento” (Centre of Sporting Excellence) and who have been recently awarded the prize for sports in schools by The Province of Cádiz’s Sports Press Association.

The Town Hall will give the new ground to the hockey club to use and run. It will be built on a site in sector III of Camposoto, bordered by the following four streets: Cartageneras, Malaguetas, Estrella and Sol.

The plot measures 11,096 m2 and the installations will be built on two levels. On the higher level there will be the entrance to the grounds, the stands and changing rooms, and just below there will be an artificial hockey field, an indoor hockey court and more changing rooms. The two floors will be connected by stairs and ramps.

The installations will have all the necessary sports equipment (goalposts, benches…), infirmary, storage rooms, offices and cafeteria as well as an irrigation system, and perimeter fencing. The total estimated cost of 1873,593 euros will be shared by San Fernando Town Hall and the Andalusian local Government’s Office of Tourism, Commerce and Sport.

A 4000 year-old sport

The first hockey matches were played some 4000 years by the Chinese, Persians and Aztecs. In 12th century the French began to play “Crosse” or “Hoquet” from which the present name derives but it was not until the 19th century that the English transformed it into the game we know today. 

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