The day the 2020 Tokyo Olympics were postponed was, for many athletes, a deflating end to years of planning.

For Hockeyroos goalkeeper Rachael Lynch – it was a call she desperately wanted to be made.

Hockeyroos goalkeeper Rachael Lynch is a nurse at Fiona Staney Hospital. Credit:Tony McDonough

Lynch has worked as a nurse one day a week alongside her elite hockey career for the past 10 years, and the Olympics being pushed back a year is now allowing her to move to the front line of the fight against coronavirus full-time.

"I had hoped that it would get postponed," Lynch said. "I'd been getting quite frustrated in the lead up to that, I knew that I wanted to be at the hospital and working and also distancing myself from the other hockey girls in our program."