Matthew Sarmento

Biography

Matthew Sarmento has more than 125 senior national caps since making his international debut in 2011. Sarmento had gone to the University of Victoria intent on making the varsity soccer team, but after surviving the first two rounds of cuts, he failed the fitness test. He decided to connect with his old provincial coach, who happened to be UVic’s field hockey head coach. After making that team, he joined the junior national team in an open tryout in January 2011. Sarmento won a silver medal with Canada at the 2012 Junior Pan American Championship before helping the senior squad win silver at the 2013 Pan American Cup. 

In 2015 he was part of the Canadian team that won a quarterfinal shootout over New Zealand at the FIH World League Semifinals, a victory that would eventually secure Canada’s qualification for Rio 2016. A few weeks later, he helped Canada win silver at the 2015 Pan Am Games in Toronto, scoring three goals on seven shots. Sarmento made his Olympic debut at Rio 2016. 

In 2018, Sarmento competed at the Commonwealth Games and the FIH World Cup. He was also with the Canadian team during the Olympic qualification tournament in October 2019 in Vancouver when they defeated Ireland in a shootout to earn their spot at Tokyo 2020.

A Little More About Matthew

Getting into the Sport: Started playing field hockey at age 14 because his high school required him to play a spring sport; the English teacher was a former national team member and convinced him to try it out… Had played ice hockey and was able to transfer his right-handed shooting to the field… Outside Interests: Studied Health and Recreation at the University of Victoria… Graduated from the University of British Columbia with a degree in Kinesiology… Enjoys cooking… Odds and Ends: Favourite motto: “Hard work beats talent when talent doesn’t work hard”… Nickname: Sarmy…