India appoint South African Craig Fulton as head coach of men's hockey team

The 48-year-old was the assistant coach of Belgium at the Tokyo Olympics, where they won the gold medal.

Hockey India Federation has today announced Craig Fulton as the new head coach of the Indian Men's Hockey Team. The announcement was made, ahead of the team's home matches in the FIH Hockey Pro League starting from 10th March.

The 48-year-old South African, with nearly 25 years of coaching experience, will join the team at the earliest upon completing formalities.

Fulton, a true believer in leadership, has shown exemplary results in his previous roles. His rise to fame started with a stint with the Irish Men's Team as the Head Coach between 2014 to 2018 when the team qualified for the Rio Olympic Games 2016. this was the Irish team's first Olympic qualification in 100 years. This historic feat also won him the FIH Coach of the Year in 2015.

Following this, he worked as the Assistant Coach with the reigning Olympic Champions Belgium, where the Belgium team won the Gold medal in Tokyo. He was also part of the Belgian Coaching Staff when the team lifted the World title in 2018, in Bhubaneswar.

He was named Belgium Coach of the Year 2023 after coaching the Belgium club which won the Belgium League. He has also been a part of the Belgium national team's rise in world hockey, taking the team to World No 3 in 2023 from World No.5 in 2018.

In his illustrious career as a hockey player with the South African squad, Fulton has 195 international caps over a span of 10 years playing international hockey. He has played for his home team South Africa at Atlanta Olympics 1996 and Athens Olympics 2004. He has also played at the World Cup and Commonwealth Games.

Talking about selecting Craig Arthur Fulton for the Indian Men's Hockey Team Chief Coach's role, President, Hockey India Padma Shri Dr Dilip Tirkey said, "I am very pleased to state that Hockey India has finalised Craig Fulton for the Chief Coach's role with the Indian Men's Hockey team. I have had the honour of playing against him and now I look forward to closely working with him in this new phase for the Men's Hockey team.

"He comes with tremendous experience in coaching and his work ethics induces confidence of raising the team's performance in world hockey. I welcome Craig to India and wish him the best."

Speaking on the occasion, Craig Arthur Fulton said, “It is an honour to be appointed in the role of Chief Coach for the Indian Men’s Hockey team. India has a deep history and legacy of the sport and I look forward to working to take this forward with the current team which has some very promising talent.”