The Hockey Paper, a weekly digest of domestic club results and reports, and international coverage of the sport, will be published for the first time next week.
Edited by SJA member Rod Gilmour, The Hockey Paper comes from Greenways Publishing, the sports newspaper stable based in south-west London, and will follow the successful coverage format used with The Non-League Paper, The Cricket Paper, The Rugby Paper and The Golf Paper, among other titles.
The hockey title is pitched at a game which is encountering additional interest in Britain following the national women’s team winning gold at the Rio Olympics, but a sport which its advocates usually feel no longer receives the column inches it deserves in the national papers. Gilmour, for example, is a former hockey writer for the Daily Telegraph.
Utilising the news room resources of the Wimbledon-based agency Sportsbeat for much of its weekly results coverage, the first edition of The Hockey Paper will be available on news-stands for £1.50 on Wednesday November 16.
Online subscriptions are also available at www.thehockeypaper.co.uk .
“We will also report on hockey action throughout Europe and the wider world along with big interviews with star players, special features on grass roots, universities and schools,” the publishers said in their announcement of the launch.
Gilmour’s team will include leading figures from the game such as Simon Mason, Nick Irvine, Beckie Middleton and Todd Williams as columnists.
David Emery, a former Daily Express sports editor, who is a former SJA chairman and driving force behind Greenways, said: “This is a thrilling time for hockey fans in the UK after the success in the Rio Olympics. We believe The Hockey Paper can tap into that interest and reflect the ever-growing status of the game.”