FIH Pro League champions: The Dutch dominate both men's and women’s roll of honour - full list of winners
The Netherlands have won four of the five women’s FIH Pro League titles so far while the Dutch men have emerged as winners in two editions.
Hockey
The FIH Pro League is the latest big-ticket tournament in the international hockey calendar.
Started in 2019 with a men’s and a women’s version, the FIH Pro League invites the nine of the best teams from around the world to compete.
In the 2019 edition, each team played 14 league matches, with the top-four advancing to the semi-finals and the winner was determined by a final.
The Netherlands won the inaugural women’s FIH Pro League, beating Australia in a penalty shoot-out in the final.
Australia won the first men’s FIH Pro League after defeating Belgium 3-2 in the final.
Starting with the 2020-21 season, the FIH Pro League follows a round-robin format where each team plays the other team twice - home and away - and the team with the most points after 16 league matches is declared the champion.
In the FIH Pro League, a team is awarded three points for a win and one point for a draw. Any match that ends in a draw moves to a penalty shoot-out, with the winners of the penalty shoot-out getting a bonus point.
In the 2020-21 season, a number of matches were cancelled due to the COVID-19 pandemic and so, a points percentage system was used to determine the winner. A team’s points percentage was calculated by dividing their points total against the total points available.
Belgium were declared the 2020-21 men’s FIH Pro League winners, with a points percentage of 76.19 (having won 32 of the 42 points in the 14 matches they played). The Netherlands won their second women’s FIH Pro League title in 2020-21, having won 88.9 per cent of their total points (they won 32 points out of 36 in their 12 matches).
In the five FIH Pro League editions so far, the Dutch have dominated.
While the Netherlands women have won four titles, the men have two victories to their name. Australian men, who narrowly beat the Dutch to the 2023-24 title, are also two-time Men's FIH Pro League champions.
The Indian men’s hockey team made its FIH Pro League debut in the 2020-21 season, finishing in fourth place with a points percentage of 62.5. In the FIH Pro League 2021-22, India finished a credible third before ending the campaign as the fourth-best team again in 2022-23.
The India women’s hockey team made an impressive debut in the FIH Pro League in the 2021-22 season, finishing third but their second season, 2023-24, was less rewarding as they ended the campaign in eight position, narrowly escaping relegation.