WAIS Athletes Earn Selection for Australian Hockey Teams
WAIS athletes have been named on the Kookaburras and Hockeyroos squads for the up-coming Oceania Cup tournament in New Zealand.
The Kookaburras squad will feature four WAIS scholarship holders with; Fergus Kavanagh, Trent Mitton and Tyler Lovell joined by Aran Zalewski. **
The Hockeyroos squad features Ashleigh Nelson and Kathryn Slattery, both of whom represented Australia at the World League semi finals held in Belgium earlier this year.
The Oceania Cup tournament will run from October 21-25, with the men set to face Samoa, New Zealand and Fiji before the medal rounds, whilst the women are set for a crunch clash with rivals New Zealand first up, before facing Samoa and Fiji en route to the classification matches.
Kookaburras’ Senior Assistant coach Paul Gaudion said the youthful inclusions in the Australian men’s team was reflective of their on going plan to develop a broad base of talent outside of peak tournament years.
“This is a strong squad. I like the youth in our forward line – the likes of Blake Govers, Flynn Ogilvie and Tom Craig. We’re giving them an opportunity to step up and push for selection for a major championships. If we don’t give them these opportunities now it’s hard to know how they’ll cope with something like the Olympic Games,” he said.
“It’s no different to what we would normally do outside of a World Cup or Olympic Games. We’re still developing as a group and building for sustained success.”
Hockeyroos coach Adam Commens confirmed he had selected what he considered to be Australia’s strongest line up at present.
“We feel this is our strongest team at the moment on form. Those players we’ve selected have performed well at the AHL and in the Korean series and national camp previously,” he said.
“The Oceania Cup is a really important tournament for us. It’s a continuation of our preparation for next year’s Olympic Games and there are vital world ranking points at stake.”
**WAIS athlete Tristan Clemons was called up to the squad as a late replacement for Andrew Charter
-with HockeyAus