KUALA LUMPUR, July 23 — Malaysia are among four countries that will feature in the 2018 Darwin International Hockey Open, slated to be held from Sept 18-22 at Marrara Hockey Stadium in Darwin, Australia.

According to the Hockey Australia website;www.hockey.org.au, other countries are the 2016 Rio Olympics gold medallist Argentina, world number 16 Japan and also hosts Australia.

Hockey Australia chief executive officer, Matt Favier said they were delighted  to see the tournament received enormous response from both fans and the players in the country every year.

"Hockey Australia is excited for the third instalment in 2018 which appears to be the best line-up of international teams yet,” he said.

Sharing his sentiments are the Australia player, Jeremy Hayward which regarded the four-nation tournament as the best platform to gauge the ‘Kookaburras’ preparation in the 2018 Men’s Hockey World Cup, slated to be held in India in November.

"Argentina are the Olympic champions, so we know they’ll be very tough, while Malaysia and Japan are also in the World Cup, so they’ll be preparing for that along with us,” he said.

"Japan are an up and coming side working towards the 2020 Tokyo Olympics while Malaysia are always dangerous and can beat any side on their day,” added Hayward who is also the Kookaburras’ Darwin product.

Based on the tournament fixtures released by Hockey Australia, Malaysia will kick-off their campaign against Australia on Sept 18, Japan on Sept 19 before completing the preliminary matches against Argentina, two days later.

Two teams which collected highest points wil advance to the final while two bottom teams will play in the third/fourth play-off match. — Bernama