Kookaburras The Yardstick For Blacksticks

Newcastle Herald

Wednesday November 21, 2007

By RENEE VALENTINE

NEW Zealand coach Shane McLeod

believes a three-match Test

series with the world No.1-rated

Kookaburras, starting tonight at

the Newcastle International Hockey

Centre, will provide the Blacksticks

with the perfect launching pad

to their last chance at Olympic

qualification.

Australia booked passage to next

year's Olympics ahead of their trans-

Tasman rivals with victory at the

Oceania qualifiers in September.

The Blacksticks' only hope of

competing in Beijing now rests on

them winning a six-nation qualifying

tournament they will host in February.

'One of the reasons why we've

put these type of games early in our

competition schedule is so we can

see what cracks are in our game

at the moment, where we need to

develop further and how far away

we are from the top of the world,?

McLeod said.

'It's early and we would have liked

to have had more preparations to

play these games in some ways but,

having said that, to have them now

serves its purpose in the big picture.'

Continued Page 86

Blacksticks look to Kookas for yardstick

From Page 88

McLeod could not remember the last time the Blacksticks, who are rated No.10 in the world, had beaten Australia in men's hockey but was confident the gap between the two sides was narrowing.

"They are very experienced in what they do, they are well coached and they're used to winning," McLeod said.

"There's a little bit of a stigma attached to playing against Australia and that is something we have to get over, but I think the two sides are getting closer and closer.

"I think our last performances against Australia in the Oceania qualifier shows that the first one we lost 2-1 and it was pretty close and the second game was 3-1 and Australia really grabbed that game in the second half."

The Blacksticks will be without experienced defender Hayden Shaw and midfielder Ben Collier while Australia should be at full-strength for what will be their final hit-out before they head to Malaysia in search of glory in the Champions Trophy.

The match tonight, which starts at 6pm, will be the first time international men's hockey has been played in Newcastle in 17 years.

The Test series will continue in Sydney with games on Friday and Sunday.

AAP reports: Star striker Jamie Dwyer has warned the Kookaburras must once more raise the standard of men's hockey to a new level if they want to retain their Olympic gold medal next year.

Dwyer, who scored the history-making golden goal that sealed Australia's first men's hockey gold medal, said the Kookaburras would need more than the remarkable fitness and never-say-die attitude which characterised their march to gold in Athens.

Dwyer has spent most of the four years since playing in Holland, Spain and India and believes Australia's European rivals have lifted their fitness and quality in the past three years.

"We did raise the bar in 2004 with our fitness levels and relentlessness, but we need to change our game again, we need to get fitter again because everyone's caught up to us," Dwyer said. "The game's changed. The Europeans are starting to do some things we've never seen before."

© 2007 Newcastle Herald

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