New Zealand men's hockey coach Shane McLeod is relishing the prospect of matching wits with Australian coaching legend Ric Charlesworth in the Oceania Cup tournament beginning in Invercargill today.
The men's and women's tournaments will run simultaneously with just three teams competing in each - Australia, New Zealand and Samoa.
The competitions end on Saturday with the top two teams in each meeting in the final after round-robin play.
The winners of the men's tournament qualify for next year's World Cup in New Delhi while the women's champions get direct entry into next August's World Cup in Argentina.
Charlesworth, who replaced Beijing Olympics coach Barry Dancer, is a renowned coach and led the Australian women's team to four Champions Trophies, two World Cups and back-to-back Olympic gold medals at the Atlanta and Sydney Games during his 1993-2000 reign.
"Ric will have his team running really well, so in that respect, it'll be quite an exciting prospect to be working against someone who has such a history," McLeod said yesterday.
McLeod has named a side totalling 1595 international caps, 14 more than an Australian side who will be leaning heavily on the redoubtable Brent Livermore, who has 306 caps, Jamie Dwyer with 214 and Liam De Young, who has 215. New Zealand skipper Ryan Archibald and Kyle Pontifex redress the balance with 213 and 216 caps respectively.
The New Zealand side has also been in strong form with no defeats in their past 11 matches.
Australia arrive with a side that Charlesworth is rebuilding for the 2012 Olympics after a spate of retirements.
"It's a good time to play Australia, I think," McLeod said. "They have talented young players but so do we in Simon Child, Nick Wilson and Arun Panchia. We are probably as strong as we have ever been."
In the women's competition, New Zealand will have to stave off an Australian side still stinging from being relegated from the Champions Trophy for the first time in their history.
New Zealand coach Mark Hager is also rebuilding. He will be looking to Katie Glynn and Gemma Flynn, who starred for New Zealand with goals at the Junior World Cup in Boston, Massachusetts, this month, to back up experienced strikers Krystal Forgesson and Charlotte Harrison.
Samoa's teams have little chance of making an impression. Their women have not played in the Oceania Cup in 25 years while the men are making their debut in the competition. Both will be playing on artificial turf for the first time.
- NZPA
