Hockey star Ashley Jackson will spend the weekend preparing for the biggest day of his life as his first Olympic campaign starts in Beijing on Monday.

The 20-year-old from Kings Hill, West Malling, was one of thousands of athletes taking part in the opening ceremony at the Olympic Stadium on Friday.

Jackson and his team-mates flew into the Chinese capital last Sunday after 10 days spent acclimatising and training at the GB camp in Macau.

He said: "Everything is going well. We were staying in a five-star resort in Macau and had a week or so of hard training in hot, wet conditions and two warm-up matches."

The attacking midfielder scored as GB overturned a 1-0 half-time deficit to beat New Zealand in the Hong Kong football stadium. His penalty corner strike just after the break paved the way for a 2-1 victory, which they followed up two days later with a 3-2 win over the Blacksticks.

The East Grinstead star said he was looking forward to getting the competition underway against Pakistan – ranked one place higher than GB at seventh in the world – on Monday.

He said: "There are no nerves at the moment really, just excitement but I’m sure on the eve of the first match they will kick in. We got to see the stadium and I can’t wait to start the first match now."