Ireland men's and women's teams to play Olympic qualification tournament in Valencia

The Irish men's side's opponents in Valencia will include Belgium and Spain

The Ireland women's and men's teams will both travel to Valencia in Spain for the Olympic qualification tournament in January.

It follows the conclusion of the continental championships where the five winners joined 2024 hosts France in qualifying for next year's Olympics.

A further 16 countries, including Ireland, secured their places for the qualification tournaments.

Ireland's head coaches, Sean Dancer and Mark Tumilty, have welcomed being drawn to travel to Valencia.

The preparations for the Ireland women's team have been helped with World Cup silver medallists Chloe Watkins and Anna O'Flanagan joining up with the squad after an absence of two years.

They last played in the World Cup qualifying tournament in Pisa in October 2021 helping Ireland progress to the finals. Lurgan's Bethany Harper, formally Barr, and Emily Beatty have also rejoined the senior panel.

"I'm happy it's Spain but both tournaments were always going to be challenging," said women's head coach Dancer.

"Going to India would have created logistics and a tough tournament. Look, there's no easy tournament to qualify for the Olympics, finishing in the top three out of eight. We're going to have to beat teams ranked above us and that's an excellent challenge for us to try and step up to.

"We'll try and focus on ourselves, make sure we play our style of game and be ready for those key moments when they arise. We are excited now, at least we know where we're going and what we have to do."

"I think we're actually in an excellent place now where we have 30 players in the squad and we have real competition for all places. So I think creating competition within the group is really important.

Sean Dancer talks to his Ireland team before the EuroHockey game against Germany in August

"As a coach, I always want the best possible team playing for Ireland. So certainly having the opportunity for someone like Anna and Chloe to come back within the mix is excellent for us. I think there are obviously selection headaches and you have to work through that for the players involved and for us as a group but certainly they're good headaches to have."

Dancer's squad will also get a feel for the pitch in Valencia when they take part in a pre-Christmas Five Nations Tournament and will face two potential Olympics qualifier opponents, Spain and Belgium, as well as Germany and India.

"It's our last lead-in and obviously with us not being in the Pro League, we probably haven't had as many actual official competition matches as some other countries," he added.

"What I like about December is that it's an actual tournament. We're playing to win. We get to play against a couple of teams as well from January, so it gives us a good checkpoint. Just as they'll have a checkpoint against us, we get to find out a bit more about them. It's our final preparation, so we have to really make the most of it."

Ireland men's head coach Tumilty believes Valencia is an excellent venue for a number of reasons.

He said: "Obviously Spain is much more convenient for a player point of view and hopefully a spectator point of view as well.

"And I suppose with the men and women both attending the same tournament, hopefully we can have a reasonable following at the games. I think both tournaments are as competitive, so do I think there's any advantage in which tournament you got into, I don't think so but I think the fact that we're in Spain is definitely beneficial to ourselves."

The Ireland men's squad have played Argentina recently in Eindhoven and Great Britain is some training games at Bishop Abbey and will finalise their preparations at a camp in Barcelona at the end of November.

"We will probably go to Valencia slightly earlier just so we can hopefully, fingers crossed, make use of the better weather and so we can spend probably the week together as a group prior to the tournament starting," he added Tumelty.

"I think the progress we've made in the last 12 months definitely gives us a reasonable opportunity to make it to Paris but it will be tough. I think both the men and women have significant challenges to qualify but I think both are capable and I agree 100% that if Ireland could get the men and women to the Olympics, we then need to grow the game from there.

Ireland player and head coach Mark Tumilty celebrate a victory over South Africa

"That's as much our responsibility as the organization's responsibility. So yeah, it's important and would be excellent for the game."

The Irish women finished in fifth place at the EuroHockey Championships in Germany in August while the men won the EuroHockey Division II title in Dublin in July to advance.

Based on their current world ranking the 16 countries have been divided into two groups with eight teams travelling to each location.

Ireland's women will compete against Belgium, Great Britain, Spain, Korea, Canada, Malaysia and Ukraine while the Irish men are up against Belgium, Spain, Korea, Japan, Austria, Egypt and Ukraine.

The other women's tournament will be hosted in Ranchi, India and will include Germany, India, New Zealand, Japan, Chile, United States, Italy and Czech Republic.

Great Britain's men will compete in Muscat, Oman along with Germany, New Zealand, Malaysia, Pakistan, Canada, Chile and China.

The teams that finish in the top three of each of the four FIH Hockey Olympic Qualifiers 2024 tournaments will seal their qualification to the Olympic Games Paris 2024. The Qualifiers will be played between 13-21 January 2024.