Dundee's Ross Stott, one of the youngest hockey players named in Team Scotland for the Delhi Commonwealth Games this October, had always hoped to compete in a Commonwealth Games...

…he just hadn’t expected it to be so soon.

“Originally, I was aiming for the Glasgow Games in 2014 so to get picked for this one is pretty amazing and a real bonus,” said the 22 year old, who helped impress selectors at last November’s World Cup qualifier in New Zealand by scoring the goal which secured Scotland’s bronze medal.

Last year Stott was named in Scotland’s 42 man Delhi Games squad, which he described as ‘a really competitive group’. Through the year it has been whittled down to a final 16 which Stott is in, despite tearing ankle ligaments part way through the selection process.

“I wasn't able to run for four weeks and I missed the majority of the second half of the season,” said Stott, who was brought back to fitness by the Tayside & Fife Institute of Sport, part of the sportscotland institute of sport’s regional network which provides high performance expertise to Scotland’s potential world class talent.

“I saw Maggie Hendry, physio at the institute, twice a week then I built myself back up to where I was before.

“I did everything the coaches asked; trained hard and committed myself to the programme. They saw that I had improved and noticed my work rate and general fitness.”

In Delhi Scotland’s men face two difficult opponents in the group stages - Pakistan in their opening match, then the world’s top team, Australia.

“It's not going to be easy games against those, but you don't expect any games to be easy,” said Stott.

“Scotland doesn’t usually get the opportunity to play the best in the world so it will be good to see how I can compete against Australia, who are the best team in the world at the moment by a long way. This is my first major tournament so hopefully I will do myself some justice against the best players.”

Team Scotland will up the ante over the next month to ensure they meet the challenge in the best of shape. Physical conditioning will intensify and training in a heat chamber will help the athletes acclimatize for what they can expect in India.

“The institute strength and conditioning training is important because the teams we are going to play against will be stronger than we are used to,” said Stott. “It is important for us to get a good strength programme so we are fit enough to work hard on the pitch.”

The experience of playing top teams will be invaluable as Scotland’s men look towards competing for a medal place at the 2014 Glasgow Commonwealth Games. A top eight position for Scotland’ men in Delhi would be regarded as a good result.

“That would be realistic for us,” said Stott. “But we are going out to play our best and see what happens.

“The World Cup qualifier in New Zealand was a good example. We went out there to see what happened and we ended up coming back with a medal. Fingers crossed, maybe we will do the same in Delhi and cause some upsets.”