Ireland women begin their road to the Paris 2024 Olympics hoping to break a 39-year hoodoo over England on Friday night. Ireland and England will open the 2023 EuroHockey Championships in Monchengladbach, with the Green Army having lost all 10 previous Euro matches against their rivals. Should they prevail, Sean Dancer’s side will be well set with an encounter against Scotland to follow 24 hours later. Ireland have finished sixth twice in their last three EuroHockey tournaments. This would be enough for them to qualify direct for the Olympic qualification event in January. Only the winner of the women’s and men’s European title will earn a ticket to Paris. Ireland’s captain Katie Mullan said: ‘We have played against the top three ranked nations in the world earlier this year, having taken on Argentina a few months ago and the Dutch a few weeks ago and we got our best result in recent years against the Netherlands.’ ‘This group of players will be ready for the challenge.’ Ireland welcome back star goalkeeper Ayeisha McFerran after an extended season with her Dutch club. Coach Sean Dancer said: ‘Lizzy Murphy has taken this as an opportunity to play and develop her game further and we are now in a position of having two strong international keepers leading into this tournament.’ McFerran is one of the World Cup silver medalists from 2018 alongside Mullan, Lena Tice, Deirdre Duke and Róisín Upton. Meanwhile, there are a dozen Tokyo Olympians in the squad, while the only player who did not play in the World Cup last summer is Caitlin Sherin, who made her debut against Chile last month. Ireland take on hosts Germany in their last pool game next Tuesday. With Germany men having thrillingly won the World Cup in January – when they produced a trio of late wins to lift the title – the Championships are set to be well attended. Most days are near 10,000 sell outs.