The Irish Ladies Hockey Union yesterday confirmed the line-up for May's Four Nations' Tournament at Belfield in which Ireland will play England, Russia and Scotland as part of their build-up to August's European Nations' Cup finals in Cologne.
After playing Spain and Germany earlier this month in Barcelona May's tournament will give coach Riet Kuper an opportunity to assess England, yet another of Ireland's European pool opponents, ahead of the finals.
All three nations beat Ireland in their last meetings - England (3-0) and Russia (4-2) had comfortable victories in the 1997 World Cup Qualifier in Zimbabwe while Scotland won a friendly international (2-1) in Dundee last April.
Ireland compete in another four nations' tournament in June in Canada - the line-up has yet to be confirmed but the United States and India have been invited to join the hosts and Ireland in the Vancouver tournament.
:quality(70)/s3.amazonaws.com/arc-authors/irishtimes/f1b9c8e1-66b0-4f83-ad11-12d4383c8edb.png)
:quality(70)/cloudfront-eu-central-1.images.arcpublishing.com/irishtimes/YVIRIOZQ35EWRPZXR27KGMO6YU.png)