Matthew Guest

Biography

Matthew Guest has more than 110 senior national caps since making his debut in 2008. He helped Canada win the silver medal at the 2011 Pan Am Games in Guadalajara, scoring a hat trick in Canada’s opening match victory over Trinidad and Tobago. He ended the tournament as Canada’s second-leading scorer with seven goals. He scored three more goals at the 2015 Pan Am Games in Toronto where Canada again won silver. Just a couple of weeks earlier, Guest had competed with the squad that defeated New Zealand in a quarterfinal shootout at the FIH World League Semifinals, a win that would eventually secure Canada’s qualification for Rio 2016 where he made his Olympic debut. Guest has also made two Commonwealth Games appearances, in 2010 and 2014. He was part of Canada’s silver medal run at the 2013 Pan Am Cup and the second place finish at the 2014 Champions Challenge 1 in Malaysia.  Guest has dealt with numerous significant injuries since a displaced left thumb fracture in 2013 that required pinning. He spent a large portion of 2015 on the sidelines with injuries that seemed to come just as previous ones were healing. There were two head injuries, one resulting in bleeding around the brain. He fractured his thumb again, and then in a separate injury, ruptured ligaments in that same thumb which required surgery.

Getting to know…

Family: Parents Robert and Sandra… Brother Aaron… Wife Candace… Moved back and forth between Australia and Canada as a kid… His mother is from Lethbridge, Alberta and always instilled a strong sense of Canadian patriotism in her children… His father played professional Aussie Rules Football… Getting into the Sport: Started playing field hockey at age 9, introduced to it by his brother… Outside Interests: Studied Medicine at the University of Melbourne, graduating in 2009… Works as a doctor in Melbourne… Considers himself a coffee snob and loves to drink it post-training… Enjoys travelling… Odds and Ends: Role model is Matthew Higgins, a player from his hometown who embodies every attribute of the elite athlete that he wants to be… Nickname: Guesty… Before each game, attaches his wedding ring to the handmade tobacco pouch gifted by Toronto 2015 Assistant Chef de Mission Waneek Horn-Miller that is now always in his hockey bag for luck…