Abstract
The aim of this review is to investigate the common wearable devices currently used in field hockey competitions, and to understand the hockey-specific parameters these devices measure. A systematic search was conducted by using three electronic databases and search terms that included field hockey, wearables, accelerometers, inertial sensors, global positioning system (GPS), heart rate monitors, load, performance analysis, player activity profiles, and competitions from the earliest record. The review included 39 studies that used wearable devices during competitions. GPS units were found to be the most common wearable in elite field hockey competitions, followed by heart rate monitors. Wearables in field hockey are mostly used to measure player activity profiles and physiological demands. Inconsistencies in sampling rates and performance bands make comparisons between studies challenging. Nonetheless, this review demonstrated that wearable devices are being used for various applications in field hockey. Researchers, engineers, coaches, and sport scientists can consider using GPS units of higher sampling rates, as well as including additional variables such as skin temperatures and injury associations, to provide a more thorough evaluation of players’ physical and physiological performances. Future work should include goalkeepers and non-elite players who are less studied in the current literature.
Highlights
Field hockey is an invasion game that is played in four quarters over 60 min
The results of this review revealed that wearables in field hockey are commonly used to measure player profile activities and physiological demands
The 39 studies in this review provided information regarding the competitive levels of the players that are most likely to use these wearables, as well as the types and purpose of wearables used during field hockey competitions
Summary
Field hockey is an invasion game that is played in four quarters over 60 min. This is after a rule change in 2015, as the game was previously played in two 35-min halves. As a fast-paced, intermittent sport, the physical fitness of field hockey players is important to the individual and the overall team performance [1,2,3]. Wearable technologies in sports have been on the rise Sports such as soccer, rugby, and Australian football are turning to devices that provide easier in-depth monitoring of a player’s fitness progress as compared to the traditional video analysis [4,5,6]. With the increasing demand of wearables in team sports, many devices such as heart rate monitors, global positioning system (GPS) devices, and accelerometers have been developed to assess the different physical and physiological demands of the players during training and competitions [5,7,8]. The advancement of technology has allowed the integration of multiple devices into one single sensor, to enable a more thorough evaluation of a player’s progress during training and competitions [1,9]
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