Ireland 6 Russia 1:Ireland's men got over a nervous start to their Olympic qualifying campaign at Belfield today before running out comfortable winners over Russia.
Ireland opened the scoring in the 15th minute with a John Jermyn drag flick and doubled their lead less than a minute later when Timmy Cockram picked up the opportunity to nick the ball over the line after some good work by Jermyn.
Ireland had several chances for a third but it was Russia who scored next when Ravshanzhon Zakirov pounced on a rebound in the 25th minute to make it 2-1 before half-time.
Nine minutes into the second half Ireland increased their lead when Mitch Darling got on the end of Chris Cargo's initial reverse stick after a few Irish attempts to put it away.
Peter Caruth made it 4-1 just four minutes later when Eugene Magee broke from the left and rode a number of tackles before Caruth fired home.
Conor Harte made it 5-1 when he dragged home and Michael Watt finished off the Irish scoring with a classy reverse stick on 59 minutes.
Ireland:David Harte; John Jackson, Geoff McCabe, Ronan Gormley (capt), Michael Watt, Eugene Magee, Andrew McConnell, Michael Darling, David Ames, Paul Gleghorne, Conor Harte.
Reserves (all used):Chris Cargo, John Jermyn, Peter Caruth, Timmy Cockram, Stuart Loughrey.