New Zealand women’s hockey squad announced for three test series against Argentina starting March 26
New Zealand women’s hockey squad that is to play against World no.1 Argentina has been announced. The announcement was made by the team coach, Mark Hager.
The Black Sticks will take on Argentina in Whangarei and North Harbour, New Zealand in a three match test series starting March 26 and ending March 29.
Hager has yet again attempted to experiment by making different player combinations that he hopes will put up a stiff resistance against the number one team in the world. The match, he admits, will be a challenge.
“We always try and win series, obviously this one will be a difficult challenge, but it will be great to benchmark ourselves against the number one team in the world and see exactly where we are placed,” he said.
This will be the third home series to be played by the Black Sticks in the past two months; its last encounters were against Korea and Japan in which Hager’s team won convincingly.
After the recent successes, Hager is keen to keep experimenting with the players and has rotated five less-experienced faces into the squad.
“We have been provided with opportunities to assist our playing depth to see which players proved to have real potential and what combinations worked,” he said.
The players picked out of the development squad include Alana Millington, Sophie Devine, Jan Burrows, Petrea Webster and Amanda Green
Hager confirmed that these players, with the exception of Green, will join the National Squad as permanent players.
Four senior players namely Lucy Talbot, Anita Punt, Krystal Forgesson and Gemma Flynn are out playing in the European League, whereas Kate Mohan has not yet recovered from her shoulder injury.
The first test match against Argentina will be played at the Rosvall ITM Hockey Centre, Whangarei on March 26. The second and third test will take place at the North Harbour Hockey Centre, Albany on March 28 and March 29 respectively.
New Zeland’s squad comprises of Emily Naylor, Sam Harrison, Kayla Sharland, Jan Burrows, Anna Thorpe, Stacey Michelsen and Laura Douglas as midfielders; Katie Glynn, Charlotte Harrison, Petrea Webster and Cathryn Finlayson as strikers; Ella Gunson, Clarissa
Eshuis, Alana Millington, Sophie Devine and Amanda Green as defenders whereas Sally Rutherford and Bianca Russell as goalkeepers.
Mark Hager will feature as the Head Coach along with Bryce Collins as his assistant, Sarah Leberman as the team manager, Mary Dunning as the team’s physiotherapist, Ian Hicks as the video analyst, Christel Dunshea-Mooij as the nutritionist and Rod Corban
as the Sports psychologist.
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