The competition for the Irish goalkeeping jersey lessened slightly this week following the announcement by Alison Vance that she is retiring from international hockey.
The 27-year-old schoolteacher won 45 caps and was first choice keeper until she was forced to withdraw, for family reasons, from the Irish squad for the summer's European qualifier in Helsinki.
Vance will continue to play for Portadown and Ulster but now leaves Sandra O'Gorman, Tara Browne, Sarah Hilliard and Sharon Hutchinson - the four goalkeepers named in the Irish training panel last week - to battle it out for the number one jersey.
Hermes clubmates Browne and Hilliard shared goalkeeping duties in Helsinki, but now face competition from O'Gorman, who is available again for selection after a spell out of international hockey, and Harlequins's Hutchinson, Vance's understudy in Zimbabwe last year, who returned to Ireland recently after a year in Uganda. Coach Riet Kuper hopes to take the squad to Spain this Christmas for matches against their hosts and, possibly, Germany, as part of the preparations for next summer's European Nations' Cup in Germany. Training weekends in Wales and Scotland, in April, and a Four Nations' tournament in Dublin the following month may also figure in Kuper's plans for the season.
Meanwhile on the club front, Loreto have a chance to go top of the Statoil Leinster Senior A table this weekend if they can beat Pembroke Wanderers at Serpentine Avenue. The match is the only Senior A fixture of the weekend, which sees the Coca Cola Leinster Senior Cup get under way. Trinity and Railway Union meet at Santry Avenue, in the only all-Senior A clash, while Glenanne will be wary of a strong Hermes II lineup, in their meeting in Tallaght. Old Alexandra play Railway Union's seconds - their first cup match at Alexandra College's new astro turf pitch in Milltown - while Senior A strugglers Clontarf meet Loreto II at Beaufort.
It's a quiet weekend too on the league front in Munster, where the only confirmed fixture is between Belvedere and Church of Ireland at Ballincollig. The Munster senior panel will travel to Dublin for practice matches against Hermes and Loreto on Sunday, as part of their build-up to November's Interprovincial Championships, which they will host in Cork. The match of the weekend in Ulster is the meeting of Pegasus and Randalstown in Belfast, the only teams still with a with a 100 per cent winning start to the season. Something, though, has to give at Upper Malone tomorrow
