At the annual Hockey Writers’ Club Lunch on 20 January 2016, the International Hockey Federation (FIH) President, Leandro Negre, made his customary, ‘The State of Hockey’ address to a room packed with hockey media, candidates for the Hockey Writers’ annual awards and hockey enthusiasts and supporters. It is always a valuable opportunity to get the ‘inside track’ on what is going on in the hockey world. In an Olympic year this included news on what might and might not be happening in Rio later this year. Leandro also announced that he will be standing for a third term as FIH President with the hope that he will continue to attend the HWC Luncheon for another four years.

There is perhaps a sad conclusion to draw from Leandro’s speech. If a comparable insight had been given by the head of golf, tennis, cricket, rugby, athletics or football (not that they now have a boss!) his words would have made headlines the next day. However those who attended enjoyed and appreciated Leandro’s speech.

At the conclusion of his speech he certainly surprised the Curator of The Hockey Museum by announcing that he had a presentation to make. This was a magnificent, large, embroidered pennant from the 4^th annual Barcelona Tournament held in 1976 in memory of his late father Pablo Negre (the above left photograph shows Curator Mike Smith accepting the pennant from President Negre on behalf of the Museum; credit, Peter Savage). Anyone who knows Leandro knows the affection for and esteem in which he held his father. This came over in the way that Leandro explained the aspects of the pennant. Although we have many pennants in the Museum, this one will be framed and have pride of place in our new display area, due to open in March 2016.

Mike Smith, January 2016