This week's Oceania Cup marks the start of nine hectic months for the men's Black Sticks.
After navigating their way through the four-team tournament in Stratford, which gets underway today, Colin Batch's side have a heavy diet of hockey ahead of them.
They will travel to the World League Final in India in January, the Champions Challenge in Malaysia in April, the World Cup in the Netherlands shortly after, all before the Commonwealth Games get underway in Glasgow in July.
"It's a busy calendar for us and I see this [week] as the start of the preparation for that," Batch said.
"So there's two focuses here; the development for next year but also the short term in doing well at the Oceania Cup."
New Zealand, ranked fifth in the world, will meet world No 3 Australia and Pacific Island nations Papua New Guinea and Samoa in Taranaki this week.
The Black Sticks open their Oceania Cup campaign against world No 69 PNG this afternoon before meeting Australia tomorrow followed by a rest day on Friday and they round out pool play against world No 72 Samoa on Saturday.
The finals are set for Sunday where it's all but guaranteed the hosts will meet Australia but Batch said their games against the Pacific Island sides would serve a purpose.
"It's a tricky little tournament. We've got a quality side like Australia, who have had a lot of success over the years, we are looking forward to playing them; we have to play them twice," Batch said.
"But the Island teams, the trick is to prepare well against them as well because that's part of the preparation for the Australian performance. So we need to take care ourselves in those games and have a focus about what we want to improve on."
Batch was thrown a slight curve ball yesterday with the withdrawal of James Coughlan who has a foot injury.
Wellington's Blair Hilton will replace Coughlan in the squad and the 24-year-old is poised to claim his 100th cap during the series as he currently sits on 99.
The women's tournament runs concurrently in Taranaki this week.
