Ireland went down 3-0 to Australia at the Hawke’s Bay Cup in New Zealand but Graham Shaw’s side put up a good show against the third ranked nation in the world, one that has golden aspirations for Rio this summer.

Goalkeeper Ayeisha McFerran made a string of outstanding saves but it wasn’t all one way traffic, Megan Frazer testing the Australian keeper as early as the second minute. Georgie Parker opened the scoring for the Australians in the 11th minute with a close range reverse stick but they failed to extend their lead until the third quarter, McFerran repeatedly denying them from a string of penalty corners.

The second finally came in the 40th minute, Ashleigh Nelson deflecting home a corner on the back post, and 16 minutes later Parker made it a personal double, firing home from a narrow angle to complete the scoring.

Ireland play Korea in Saturday’s classification games, with Australia taking on New Zealand and Japan meeting China in the semi-finals.