Injury Reduction Training Methods

Matthew Eyles is an Australian S&C coach with a lot of experience in international hockey. Between 2013 and 2016 he was the S&C coach for the men from Hockey India. Following his move in 2016 to the Netherlands he worked for 4 years for the Dutch national Olympic association. These days he is the full time head of S&C for the Dutch national teams, both men and women.

When it comes to practical advice for field hockey coaches seeking long-term success and athlete welfare, the single most important lesson from Matt Eyles’ masterclass is the concept of “exposure”—not only exposing athletes to the technical demands of the game, but also consistently exposing them to physical conditioning elements that reduce injury risk.

It’s tempting to focus your time and energy primarily on skill development and tactics. But as experienced coaches know, a player who’s spending weeks on the sideline due to soft tissue injuries or chronic niggles isn’t helping your team—no matter how technically gifted they are. Injury reduction, not just rehabilitation, needs to be baked into your weekly routines. As Matt Eyles succinctly said in the session:

“Exposure is one of my favorite words. Make sure we’re exposing athletes to strength training—one to two times a week is great...and if you don’t have a gym, get creative. Do it in the clubhouse. Do it on the field. Do it over Zoom. However you want to do it, get creative with it.”

Why focus on exposure?
Field hockey is demanding: players sprint, stop, cut, and accelerate constantly—meaning hamstrings, groins, and calves get a relentless workout. The majority of injuries in hockey are not catastrophic contact injuries, but soft tissue overloads that are largely preventable with good preparation. Exposing athletes, especially at the elite level but also your club and youth squads, to well-planned strength, speed, agility, and conditioning work is the best way to build robust, fatigue-resilient players.

How to use this principle day to day:

• Strength sessions: Build these into a standing routine once or twice weekly, with a bias toward full body development and special focus on lower body. Even if you don’t have a gym, bodyweight isometric exercises and unilateral work (single-leg movements) pay dividends.

• Speed exposure: Don’t reserve sprints for match day. At least once per week, schedule sprints and changes of direction—progressively, and with proper warm up. As

  Matt Eyles

  emphasized, “Speed once a week. Absolute nonnegotiable.”

• Agility, with intent: Use mini blocks of change-of-direction work, and build in reaction-based challenges. These don’t need to be fancy; a simple cone drill with surprise changes is enough if done regularly.

• Recovery planning: Exposure includes recovery. Plan genuinely passive rest days, and educate athletes on why these sessions are critical for reducing accumulated fatigue and its injury risks.

The beauty is that this approach is not just relevant to the privileged few at the international level. Even busy clubs can implement creative exposure strategies—be it isometric lunges on the stairwell or sprinting at the end of warm-ups. And don’t undervalue that time; most injury reduction work can be done in 15 minutes if well structured.

Direct advice for your coaching week:
Start small, be progressive, and make exposure nonnegotiable. If your sessions get side-tracked or squeezed, never skip your minimum dose of exposure work. As Matt Eyles insists, “A session missed is a session missed. A week missed strength training is a week missed. You’ll never get that back.”

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Why You’ll Want to Watch the Whole Video and Read More

This masterclass is jam-packed with applied solutions for real coaching problems. If you want to know exactly which exercises matter most for hockey athletes, how to plan speed and agility exposure without risking injury, how to adjust for specialist players like drag-flickers and goalkeepers, and how to spot early signs of overtraining—the full workshop is essential viewing.
The Q&A goes deep on GPS monitoring, session design, and periodization puzzles every coach faces, and Matt Eyles pulls no punches about what actually works at the top level and for youth. 
For those ready to go beyond the headlines and unlock the detailed takeaways (including specific programming pointers, key exercises and adaptation principles), keep reading below the paywall.