Hockey: First three tough clashes all must-win games for Black Sticks to stand chance of reaching semis

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Break the New Zealand women's hockey challenge at the World Cup down to this: three games must be won to at least get them challenging for the sharp end of the tournament.

The cup begins for the top 12 men's and women's teams in The Hague tonight with New Zealand starting against Belgium.

If the Black Sticks are to exceed their previous best result - fourth in Amstelveen 28 years ago - beating the lower-ranked Belgium, Korea and Japan is a must.

Then they need to find a way to challenge the world No 1 Dutch, the cup favourites, and get something out of what is sure to be a tough final round-robin tussle against Australia.

They last met the Belgians at the World League semifinal in Rotterdam a year ago, and won 4-2.

"We've heard they're playing quite well," attacker Krystal Forgesson said.

"And at this level you can't take any teams easily. We've targeted those three games and there's no excuse - we have to win."

Forgesson, whose 202 caps make her one of three double centurions in the New Zealand squad along with captain Kayla Whitelock (207) and Emily Naylor (240), is back from ankle surgery early in the year and ready to make herself a nuisance to opposing defences with her harassing style of play.

Also returning to strengthen the midfield after knee surgeries late last year are striker Katie Glynn, New Zealand's alltime leading goalscorer, and classy midfielder Stacey Michelsen.

New Zealand's last outing was the inaugural six-nation Festival of Hockey in Hastings in April. The hosts finished fourth - they won only two of six round-robin games, but interestingly given their cup draw, against Korea and Japan - and the tournament showed up some alarming issues at the defensive end.

"We recognised we had things we had to work on," Michelsen said. "Our basics were really poor compared to some other teams. Obviously the amount of goals we were leaking meant defensively tightening up in the circle, but we're scoring more goals now, which is good."

Set piece work at both ends of the field have been a focus. There are several players, including Whitelock, Glynn, midfielder Anita Punt, young defender Liz Thompson and attacker Olivia Merry who offer a range of options at attacking penalty corners.

In Forgesson's mind, New Zealand should have confidence in their prospects. They must make the top two in their pool to be in semifinal contention.

"We've been working hard on our structures for the last three or four weeks and hopefully everyone's on the same page now and understanding when we want to do certain things at different times in games ... We've definitely gained a lot more confidence.

"Katie and I are rooming together and we were talking about the tournament the other night. We truly believe we have a good chance, which is exciting."

New Zealand were seventh in the 2010 tournament in Argentina.

The men's team start their campaign early on Monday morning against the Koreans.

Their draw has their tougher matches at the end, against world No 2 and 3, Germany and the Netherlands.

Their best result at the cup is seventh, achieved in 1973, 1975 and 1982. They were ninth in Delhi four years ago.