Mats Grambusch of Germany controls the ball during men's field hockey action at the Olympics. | Photo by Alex Gottschalk/DeFodi Images via Getty Images

Field hockey at the Paris Olympic Games has been very good to the LGBTQ community. Nearly every team in both the men’s and women’s competitions that count out LGBTQ players on their rosters advanced out of the group stage and two women’s teams with out LGBTQ players, The Netherlands and Belgium, will play for a medal in the coming days.

The LGBTQ presence extends beyond just the clatter of sticks and the excitement of penalty corners though. Numerous team captains have sported forms of the rainbow captain’s armband over the course of the tournament, utilizing the platform of the Olympics to bring attention to LGBTQ populations and the issues they face.

Two of those captains, Germany’s Mats Grambusch and Xan de Waard of The Netherlands, will sport the worn message of inclusivity during the men’s and women’s gold medal games in the coming days. Both have their distinctive reasons for doing so.

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The Dutch captain wears a modified version of the armband that features the Progress Pride flag and previously wore one that includes a fist that represents the fight against racism and racial equity. For her, it represents “acceptance regardless of one’s identity, sexual orientation, cultural background or ethnicity.”

“I started wearing the band and started expressing myself more,” de Waard told All In & Win in 2023. “It is important to dwell on [these issues]. What do I notice around me? Am I aware of my own behavior and the swear words I use? … There are still plenty of steps to take. Even if people think differently or are different, you can still be in a hockey team together.”

Grambusch made headlines for wearing the rainbow armband during the 2023 FIH Men’s Hockey World Cup months after FIFA prohibited captains from wearing it during the 2022 soccer World Cup in Qatar. He began wearing the armband in 2020, but the act took on an added significance in the wake of the FIFA decision. 

Grambusch’s equal on the German women’s team, captain Nike Lorenz, sported the fist variant of the band during the tournament before her team’s quarterfinal exit last week.

“It gives me strength,” she told the Times of India during Olympic qualifying earlier this year. “I think everybody needs to find out how important it is. I think if you really want to change specific things concerning LGBTQ rights, climate activism and anti-racism, we need people in privileged positions to ask us to be responsible.”