Australia fell to Belgium in Thursday's gold-medal match, the two teams locked 1-1 after 60 minutes of regulation time before the reigning world champions held their nerve to claim a penalty shootout.

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While Illawarra pair Blake Govers and Flynn Ogilvie were among the side's best players throughout the tournament, Govers was left disconsolate post-match after having his shootout attempt denied.

For Heath Ogilvie, the former Australian indoor hockey captain and older brother of Flynn, a loss like that can galvanise a team.

"I haven't heard who's planning on staying on and who's thinking about hanging up the boots," Ogilvie said.

"This is a young core, so they should be pretty excited about what can be achieved over the next three years. They should be quite pleased it's only three years away.

"They'll have a Commonwealth Games and World Cup in that time, so there will be plenty of practice in the lead up, unlike Tokyo.

"It's a young core, they should be confident heading into the next three years."

The Kookaburras' path to Tokyo was completely different to Belgium.

Whereas the eventual winners spent the past year taking on their European counterparts, Australia were isolated in their Perth base.

Eventually, permission to play New Zealand was granted, the two sides playing six times before the Olympics.

For that reason, the Kookaburras recognise the silver medal is still a major achievement, even if it wasn't the colour they most desperately craved.

"We came here not knowing where we were on the world stage after the COVID stoppage," goalkeeper Andrew Charter said.

"To come here and put ourselves up against teams who have been playing competition for 18 months is remarkable and I think we did ourselves really proud."

The result is sure to raise questions about the manner in which the gold medalist was decided, with many questioning the lack of extra time.

Australia's sole Olympic title came via a Jamie Dwyer golden goal in the 2004 final and such was the Kookaburras' dominance through the fourth quarter, it seemed likely they would break through had the match progressed to extra time.

Instead, the decider went straight to a shootout, Belgium prevailing in the game-deciding tie-breaker.

"To lose in shootouts, it's never a good way," veteran Aran Zalewski said.

"We always want to play the game as we see it.

''We really look fondly on the 2004 gold-medal game that went to extra time and which shows the durability of this team.

''We really rate our fitness, so it was a shame that we didn't get to do that. But a shootout is what it is."

Despite the result, Heath Ogilvie said Flynn, Blake and the entire Australian side should remain proud of their achievements.

This is just the fourth Kookaburras team to win a silver medal in 65 years of Olympic hockey, a sign of how tough it is to claim a medal in the sport's showpiece event.

"To go so close is disappointing but an Olympic silver medal would be a dream come true," Ogilvie said.