Edinburgh's Chris Grassick, one of the youngsters in the Scottish hockey team which beat China 5-3 in the penalty shoot out to win the bronze medal at the World Cup qualifier event in New Zealand, arrived back in Edinburgh yesterday delighted with the team's performance.

It was an above expectation result for the Scots who were seeded fifth and had lost to the 11 places higher-ranked China 2-1 in the opening match of the pool stages.      

“The whole event was a brilliant experience and certainly the biggest competition I have competed in,” said Grassick, a Napier University business management student who turned 19 during the event. 

“We were unlucky to not get a draw in our first game with China but we all felt positive going into the third fourth playoff and we deserved to win it.” 

Winning the bronze medal was a personal triumph for interim coach Russell Garcia, whose squad for the event included a bunch of raw youngsters.

“We took a development team to play some of the better teams in the world and the consensus was we wanted to get some results out of the lower classified teams,” he said. 

“We managed that, we bonded really well, came third in the tournament and our performance rose steadily through the tournament.”

The result should help Scotland’s case for its men’s team to be supported to go to next year’s Delhi Commonwealth Games.   If they do go then the experience of having already played in a major event will stand Grassick in good stead.

“The Commonwealth Games are definitely an aim for me,” he said.  “Russell has given a lot of the young guys a great opportunity and a lot of us think we have the chance to get there He’s done a great job since he came in and there’s a really good atmosphere amongst the team.”

Grassick plays for Inverleith with Beijing Olympian, Stephen Dick, a member of last week’s Scottish team.  He is supported by the East of Scotland Institute of Sport, which has proved a valuable resource over the past year.

“It really helps having Stephen in the team because of the amount of experience he’s had over the last few years. He’s a real leader on the pitch and somebody you can look up to,” he said.

“I’ve been with ESIS for three years and it’s brilliant support.  They’ve given me a lot of physio for lots of injuries which has kept me from getting injured longer term.  My diet wasn’t great before and the nutritionist has helped me a lot.”