Great Britain men’s captain and former Newark Hockey Club star Adam Dixon announces retirement from international hockey

Great Britain men’s captain Adam Dixon has retired from international hockey.

Dixon, a former Newark Hockey Club youth star, announced he had retired following GB’s loss to India in the quarter-finals of the Tokyo 2020 Olympics.

The 34-year-old, from Newark, made 290 international appearances (111 for Great Britain, 179 for England) and won 14 medals.

Explaining his decision after the game he told Great Britain Hockey: “It’s [been] semi-secret that I’ll hang up my stick internationally.

“I’ve had 12-13 years as a professional and I am hugely grateful to UK Sport and Lottery funding.

“I can’t think what life is going to be like, not turning up to the gym, doing what I love and being around my best mates.

“I’ll still be playing club hockey (for Beeston) but it’s such a shame to end internationally on this note.

“But this group has so much to come.”

Dixon, who captained the England and Great Britain teams from the start of 2019, also addressed his side’s progress in Tokyo and GB’s plans going forward.

“In the huddle after the game, Danny Kerry (head coach) just said how proud he was to have led us through a somewhat successful Olympics,” said Dixon.

“It’s not a medal but we’ve gone further than we did in Rio and enjoyed each other’s company.

“We played with no pressure. We pushed and pushed but it wasn’t to be.

“It’s hard to hide emotions. This is the pinnacle, it hurts not to achieve dreams and ambitions.

“But in elite sport you have to take the defeats and hopefully the group will use this as a springboard to do something even better.

“We’ve got a young, exciting group who will only learn from this.

“Jack Waller, Zach Wallace, Jacob Draper, players like that have got so many years ahead of them and they’re not at their peak yet.

“My family have been so supportive, it would’ve been easy to hang up my stick earlier but I wanted to make sure I put Rio to bed and we’ve really achieved that.

“It’s been great to be part of Team GB, unfortunately we haven’t got a medal but we’ll be supporting them in the coming days.”