Matthews using hockey heroes as motivation for Team Europe's Collins Cup defence

Kat Matthews grew up playing hockey with England's Commonwealth Games heroes but is now bidding to translate her teamwork skills into success at triathlon's equivalent of the Ryder Cup. Exmouth's Matthews, 31, played for the West of England's Under-17s with Giselle Ansley and Maddie Hinch before dropping the sport when she started to take triathlon seriously while working as a physiotherapist for the army at Birmingham's Queen Elizabeth Hospital.

Ad Just a five-minute walk from Matthews' former workplace is the University of Birmingham where Ansley and Hinch wrote their names into the record books earlier this month after helping England beat Australia to seal their first Commonwealth gold after 24 years of trying. TriathlonMiller privileged to race with retiring legend StanfordA DAY AGO Matthews is using the pair's continued success and particularly goalkeeper Hinch's shoot-out heroics, which won Olympic gold for Team GB at Rio 2016 and helped England beat New Zealand in the Commonwealth semi-final, as motivation as she prepares to represent Team Europe at the second Collins Cup in Bratislava this weekend.

Matthews said: «Absolutely, I take inspiration from that. Her book of tactics is notorious and seeing things like that it draws you into your own sport.

»Somebody who you can relate to is using these key tactical and really thought-out processes, why not bring that into my sport? «So, I'm looking at my competitors. I'm looking at the bike course in detail.