Hockey Development is the latest series of the Half Court Press Podcast. Here, Tao MacLeod chats to a variety of hockey personalities, including players, coaches, umpires and media types on how to develop, grow and improve the sport, as well as discuss what’s already being done well.

Andy Mair is a well known Scottish umpire, who has officiated at a number of domestic and international events, including the EuroHockey Championships, the FIH World Cup and the Olympic Games. He has also branched out into the hockey media. Andy is the man behind photography brand Umpire Cam, that helps to provide images of the game. In this episode we chat about umpiring, the intricacies around video referrals as well as how photography and the media in general can help to promote the sport of field hockey.

Half Court Press

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The Half Court Press editor, Tao MacLeod, has written two books, entitled A Little Book About Hockey and A Little Book About Football. You can buy them now from Amazon…

A Little Book About Hockey

⁠https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0DDJMKHV6⁠

A Little Book About Football

⁠https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0FMXWKFYH⁠

Hockey Development is the latest series of the Half Court Press Podcast. Here, Tao MacLeod chats to a variety of hockey personalities, including players, coaches, umpires and media types on how to develop, grow and improve the sport, as well as discuss what’s already being done well.

Lynne Morgan is a well known supporter of the sport of hockey, within the British Isles. Aside from being a Welsh Hockey superman, she is also involved in the organisations the Hockey Museum and the Hockey Writers’ Club who look to support the growth of the sport in different ways. She is also a player for her local team Ashford (Middlesex) Hockey Club and represents Wales within the Masters setup. In 2023 Lynne was awarded the British Empire Medal (BEM) in the King’s birthday honours for services to hockey. In this episode we chat about hockey in Wales and Britain, as well as major tournaments such as the World Cup and the Olympics and the juxtaposition between international and domestic games.

Half Court Press

⁠www.halfcourtpressmagazine.com⁠

Facebook & Twitter; @HalfCourtPress1

Threads & Instagram; @half_court_press1

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The Half Court Press editor, Tao MacLeod, has written two books, entitled A Little Book About Hockey and A Little Book About Football. You can buy them now from Amazon…

A Little Book About Hockey

⁠https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0DDJMKHV6⁠

A Little Book About Football

⁠https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0FMXWKFYH⁠

Hockey Development is the latest series of the Half Court Press Podcast. Here, Tao MacLeod chats to a variety of hockey personalities, including players, coaches, umpires and media types on how to develop, grow and improve the sport, as well as discuss what’s already being done well.

Episode three is with Simon Mason, who is the Managing Director of Mercian Hockey, one of the top manufacturers of goalkeeping kit and other hockey related equipment. He is also one of the foremost English language commentators in the game, helping to provide media coverage of elite level competitions. Previously, Simon has represented the England and Great Britain men’s teams at the highest level, including events such as the Commonwealth Games, EuroHockey Championships and three Olympic Games. In this interview we chat about different tournaments (both domestic and international), the current state of hockey and how to develop the sport.

Half Court Press

www.halfcourtpressmagazine.com

Facebook & Twitter; @HalfCourtPress1

Threads & Instagram; @half_court_press1

The Half Court Press Podcast is available on…

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The Half Court Press editor, Tao MacLeod, has written two books, entitled A Little Book About Hockey and A Little Book About Football. You can buy them now from Amazon…

A Little Book About Hockey

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0DDJMKHV6

A Little Book About Football

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0FMXWKFYH

Hockey Development is the latest series of the Half Court Press Podcast. Here, Tao MacLeod chats to a variety of hockey personalities, including players, coaches, umpires and media types on how to develop, grow and improve the sport, as well as discuss what’s already being done well.

Scott Baird is a member of the Uddingston Hockey Club, in the west of Scotland, for whom he is now their Honorary President. He has an extensive experience in administrative roles, which has included being Director and Chair of Scottish Hockey Union Ltd. (2011 – 2019), being the Honorary President of West District Hockey and serving on the Indoor Competitions Committee (2009 – 2021) and the Outdoor Competitions Committee (2022 - Present). Scott is also a Scottish National League standard umpire. However, he has also acted as a technical official for both the European Hockey Federation (EHF) and the Federation of International Hockey (FIH). In addition to this Baird is a member of the Scottish Hockey Heritage Group, who look to share the stories of Scottish Hockey. In this episode we chat about who the Scottish Hockey Heritage Group are and what they do, umpiring in the sport of hockey, as well as the role administrators in the development of the game. 

Half Court Press

⁠www.halfcourtpressmagazine.com⁠

Facebook & Twitter; @HalfCourtPress1

Threads & Instagram; @half_court_press1

The Half Court Press Podcast is available on…

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The Half Court Press editor, Tao MacLeod, has written two books, entitled A Little Book About Hockey and A Little Book About Football. You can buy them now from Amazon…

A Little Book About Hockey

⁠https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0DDJMKHV6⁠

A Little Book About Football

⁠https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0FMXWKFYH⁠

Hockey Development is the latest series of the Half Court Press Podcast. Here, Tao MacLeod chats to a variety of hockey personalities, including players, coaches, umpires and media types on how to develop, grow and improve the sport, as well as discuss what’s already being done well.

Kareena "Kaz" Cuthbert (née Marshall) is a former Scottish Hockey international and captain of the ladies team. She has represented her country at the 2010 and 2018 Commonwealth Games. Kaz has recently stepped back from her role as the player-coach of Western Wildcats Hockey Club, in Glasgow. Currently she is the Head of High Performance for Bowls Scotland. In this episode we chat about the juxtaposition between domestic and international tournaments and how to better develop the game, as well as her wider views on hockey across Great Britain. 

This episode contains a small amount of strong language.

Half Court Press

www.halfcourtpressmagazine.com

Facebook & Twitter; @HalfCourtPress1

Threads & Instagram; @half_court_press1

The Half Court Press Podcast is available on…

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The Half Court Press editor, Tao MacLeod, has written two books, entitled A Little Book About Hockey and A Little Book About Football. You can buy them now from Amazon…

A Little Book About Hockey

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0DDJMKHV6

A Little Book About Football

https://www.amazon.co.uk/dp/B0FMXWKFYH

Conversations in Sport is the twenty-fourth series of the Half Court Press Podcast. Here, Tao MacLeod talks to a variety of different sporting personalities, who have a range of roles and experiences within their respective games. We chat about a range of topics including domestic participation, international tournaments, as well as corporate responsibility within sport.

In episode four we chat to John Hardie and Matthew Taylor, who both work within the sports programmes at Edinburgh Academy. John Hardie is a retired rugby player, who has moved into coaching. Born in New Zealand, he qualified to play for Scotland due to a familial link to the Scottish county of Fife. In New Zealand, he played for Southland and the Highlanders, before moving over to the UK. Here he played for Edinburgh and Newcastle Falcons. In 2015 John was picked to play for Scotland in the 2015 World Cup, reaching the quarter final stage. Since August 2024, John Hardie has been the Assistant Director of Rugby at the Edinburgh Academy. 

Matty Taylor is a newly capped goalkeeper for the Scottish national hockey team. He was a part of the squad that won the inaugural second tier of the FIH Nations Cup, in Muscat, Oman, that was held in February 2025. Also, a teacher at Edinburgh Academy, he is one of the coaches within the private school’s hockey programme. Having come through the youth teams at Inverleith Hockey Club he turned out for their first team, before moving across to play for local rivals Grange and then the University of Edinburgh team, with whom he won the Scottish Cup. In this episode we chat about school and club sport, multi-sports education for youth players, as well as the potential benefits of professionalism for minority sports.

Half Court Press

www.halfcourtpressmagazine.com

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Conversations in Sport is the twenty-fourth series of the Half Court Press Podcast. Here, Tao MacLeod talks to a variety of different sporting personalities, who have a range of roles and experiences within their respective games. We chat about a range of topics including domestic participation, international tournaments, as well as corporate responsibility within sport.

In episode three we hear from the Welsh Hockey super fan, Lynne Morgan BEM. A person of many roles within hockey Lynne is, amongst other things, a member of the Hockey Writers’ Club committee, the Welsh Masters hockey teams and Ashford (Middlesex) Hockey Club. In 2023 she was awarded the British Empire Medal for services to hockey, as part of the King’s first Birthday Honours List. In this conversation we chat about what’s been happening in Wales and Great Britain, the Hockey Writers’ Club, as well as the tournaments that fans can enjoy.

Half Court Press

www.halfcourtpressmagazine.com

Facebook & Twitter; @HalfCourtPress1

Threads & Instagram; @half_court_press1

The Half Court Press Podcast is available on…

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Conversations in Sport is the twenty-fourth series of the Half Court Press Podcast. Here, Tao MacLeod talks to a variety of different sporting personalities, who have a range of roles and experiences within their respective games. We chat about a range of topics including domestic participation, international tournaments, as well as corporate responsibility within sport.

In episode two we chat to Paul Schuttenbelt, a football coach and businessman from the town of Maastricht in the south of the Netherlands, who’s worked around the world. Since moving overseas he has been involved in football and sport in a variety of  roles and a variety of locations including Vietnam, India, Thailand and the USA. Currently he is teaching students about entrepreneurship in sports and business models in football at the Rome City Institute, in Italy. In this role he has an educational focus on ethics and using sport as a tool for development in emerging economies. In this interview we talk about sports development and corporate social responsibility. 

Half Court Press

www.halfcourtpressmagazine.com

Facebook & Twitter; @HalfCourtPress1

Threads & Instagram; @half_court_press1

The Half Court Press Podcast is available on…

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Conversations in Sport is the twenty-fourth series of the Half Court Press Podcast. Here, Tao MacLeod talks to a variety of different sporting personalities, who have a range of roles and experiences within their respective games. We chat about a range of topics including domestic participation, international tournaments, as well as corporate responsibility within sport.

In episode one, we chat to Jesse Drake and Greg Mackenzie of Edinburgh based Inverleith Hockey Club, who are both goalkeepers in the men’s first team. Here we talk about the importance of club hockey, the intricacies of goalkeeping, as well as different hockey tournaments. Hailing from New Zealand Jesse even compares and contrasts Kiwi hockey to that of where he is now playing in Scotland.

Half Court Press

www.halfcourtpressmagazine.com

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Alan Veitch is an archivist and a statistician for the sport of field hockey. He is one of the people behind the organisation that celebrates and records the game in the North of Britain, called Scottish Hockey Heritage. In this series of episodes, taken from an interview recorded in Edinburgh on May of 2025, we chat about a variety of topics, including what Scottish Hockey Heritage does, what it plans to do in the future and how you and others can help to record the history of hockey in Scotland. 

All episodes were done in conjunction with the Half Court Press and Scottish Hockey Heritage. The producer was Tao MacLeod.

Scottish Hockey Heritage

www.scottish-hockey-heritage.org

Alan Veitch Hockey Archivist and Statistician

Interview location; Edinburgh

Interview date; 09.05.2025

Episode 1; Alan Veitch of Scottish Hockey Heritage an Introduction

Episode 2; Alan Veitch on Scottish Hockey Heritage

Episode 3; Alan Veitch on the Current Activities of Scottish Hockey Heritage

Episode 4; Alan Veitch on the Future Plans of Scottish Hockey Heritage

Half Court Press

www.halfcourtpressmagazine.com

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Threads & Instagram; @half_court_press1

The Half Court Press Podcast is available on…

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