A Study of the Factor Structure on Selected Anthropometric Variables of Men Hockey Players

Abstract

Field hockey is a popular sport for men and women in many countries around the world. Field hockey has several and prestigious international tournaments for both men and women. These events include the Olympic Games, the quadrennial world Hockey Cups, the annual Champions Trophies, and world Cups for juniors. The aim of hokey is quite simple – to use sticks to dribble, pass, and shoot the ball along the pitch in an effort to score goal. The rule is very similar to those of football excepted that players use sticks instead of their feet to move the ball. A goal counts as one point and is scored when the ball, having been hit by a player inside the ‘striking circle; completely crosses the opposing goal line. Performance at optimal levels requires high levels of technical, tactical and physiological skills. Identification and selection of talented Hockey players are not straightforward procedures.  Forty-eight (N=48) men hockey players who belong to Calicut University, M.G University and Kerala University participant in the inter University hockey tournament was selected as the subjects for the study. They were tested on selected 7 Anthropometric variables, namely Height, Weight, sitting height, Leg Length, arm length, Calf Girth, Thigh Girth, selected men hockey players The data collected was analyzed by applying the mean, median, mode, standard deviation, coefficient correlation minimum score and maximum score. This has given in idea of the distribution of scores and features obtained from the data collected for the purpose of this study. Factor analysis was done to find out the prominent factors comprising of any one or all of the selected anthropometric variables among men hockey players the unloaded factors obtained were then rotated by very max method to the final solution