The International Hockey Federation (FIH) governing body has signed a media rights agreement with German public service broadcaster ARD for the upcoming FIH Hockey Olympic Qualifiers.

The deal will see ARD broadcast one semi-final and either the third-place match or the final of the men's and women's Olympic qualifiers live on the sportschau.de website.

In total, up to four games of the German national hockey teams will be shown on the service.  

Martin Schultze, director of sport at the German Hockey Federation, said: “ARD's broadcast of the deciding matches with the German teams in the men's and women's Olympic qualifier underlines our common goal of making German hockey accessible to a wide audience.

“This is a strong signal for the German Hockey Federation to further popularize our sport. The broadcast is also the result of the trusting cooperation between ARD and the DHB that has been built up over the last months.”

The German women’s national team, ranked fifth in the FIH world rankings are playing their qualifiers between January 13 and 19 in Ranchi, India, while the men’s team, who are the reigning world champions, are competing in Muscat, Oman, from January 15 to 21.

The qualifiers will produce 12 teams for the Paris 2024 Olympic Games.

The FIH recently struck similar media rights agreements with UK public broadcaster the BBC and US national network CBS for its Olympic qualifiers