Women’s EuroHockey U21 Championship II-A – Salon de Provence, France (July 28th to August 1st)
Pool A: France, Italy, Lithuania, Ukraine
Salon de Provence is the venue for the women’s EuroHockey U21 Championship II-A competition where four nations are in the mix with Euro promotion and a Junior World Cup spot on the line.
France, Italy, Lithuania and Ukraine are the contestants who will play each other in an initial four-team group before the top two advance to the final where the main prizes will be determined next Saturday.
It is a line-up which is filled with experience from other big events this summer, all looking to bring that know-how to the table.
The French hosts are captained by Olympian Mathilde Duffrene, a player who has racked up young player of the tournament awards at the FIH Nations Cup 2 and the World Cup qualifiers. She has 56 caps and 16 international goals already.
Indeed, there is a huge presence from the French side that played in the Nations Cup this summer in their line-up. They include Othane Pertzing, Violette Blanquart, Sixtine Aelion, Maiwen Cadiou de Fresquet, Alice La Guerche, Mazarine Proux (in her third Euro U21s), Aliénor du Monceau and Léopoldine Coppin.
That level of game time together should stand them in good stead ahead of this challenge where they will also hope to have a healthy local audience behind them.
Ukraine are on a high after their EuroHockey Championship qualification earlier this month when they took silver in Prague.
Five of that panel are eligible to take part in this competition including Veronika Korobkina who will be playing in her third Euro U21 campaign; she already has 20 senior caps and four goals to her name.
Sofiia Basanets (8 caps), Valeriia Bezditko (11), Kateryna Oliinyk (5) and Marharyta Mykhailiuk (18) were all part of that success in Czechia while goalkeeper Iryna Melezyhk is another to play in her third U21 competition.
The Italian side is powered by players from Butterfly Roma with the club providing five members of the panel while they have a couple of players plying their trade outside of Italy.
Captain Francisca Eschoyez is based in the US and will play with University of Maryland after two highly productive seasons with Quinnipiac, hitting double figures in both goals and assists.
Rebecca Piccolo lines out for Indiana in Belgium while co-captain Eleonora di Paola – from Butterfly – is one of the senior international stars.
The latter is one of their chief goal-getters and has 21 goals in 19 international matches across indoor and outdoor codes. It includes one during her debut international tournament at the World Cup qualifiers in March against Austria in a 3-0 win.
Italy are looking to get back up to the top division for the first time since 2008; they had won the 2014 Championship II but did not compete in 2017’s subsequent top tier.
Lithuania are have seven of their line-up from the 2024 Championship II, of which five also played in 2022 in Championship II.
Their panel also had a lot of time together on the senior stage this month with 10 of their Euro qualifiers panel – who finished sixth in Prague – eligible for the Under-21 age category.
Rugilė Daukantaitė is set to captain the team who are playing in the second tier of women’s hockey at this level for just the second time since 2014.
Their heyday was in 2008 when they finished in sixth place in the top division in Valencia.
** Click here for further stats and details about the players and the tournament
