The Dutch women's hockey team may be the side to beat at the upcoming Champions Trophy tournament in Sydney, but Hockeyroos coach Frank Murray says a green Australia have the talent to challenge for the title.

After a disappointing Beijing Olympics and some key retirements, a new-look Hockeyroos squad are back into training and determined the reclaim the country's place at the top of the international women's hockey ladder.

The first step in that campaign is the six nations Champions Trophy event to be played in Sydney from July 11-19.

Gone are stalwarts Angie Lambert, Melanie Wells, Rachel Imison and Sarah Young and in their place stand rising stars including 19-year-old Casey Eastham, midfielder Kate Hollywood and defender Kobie McGurk.

While bitterly disappointed last year with a fifth placing at the Beijing Games, Murray said the team learned some valuable lessons.

"I know you have to be very, very good to win because we played in the World Cup, the Commonwealth Games and the Olympic Games, we only lost two games across all of that, yet we came fifth," he told AAP at the tournament launch.

"We've got to get our penalty corners worked out, our midfielders able to score goals rather than just be able to create play, there's a lot of things (to improve)."

Murray says while the Netherlands are in the kind of form not seen since the Hockeyroos won back-to-back Olympic gold medals in 1996 and 2000, the current crop of Australian women have the ability to challenge them and revive the nation's hockey glory days.

"The 2000 group were phenomenal - in `96 they won a gold medal, in 2000 they were even better," Murray said.

"It's a bit like the Dutch now. The Dutch won the gold medal in Beijing, they're even better now.

"So we're going to have our work cut out but we still think we can beat them, if we can get to them."

In the way are China, England, Argentina and Germany, all of whom 22-year-old Hollywood says will be stiff competition for the fifth-ranked locals.

"We pretty much view everyone as a big threat. If we go into the game thinking this is going to be easy then that's a problem I think," she said.

With gold at London 2012 in their sights, Hollywood says the team is keen to get a home-soil Champions Trophy under their belts.

"We're going to be looking at winning it, that's our number one priority," she said. "Beijing is behind us, it's a new Olympiad now, so we're just looking ahead to the next three years.

"It's going to be a new team and new players so it's going to be exciting."

Bonny Symons-Brown
AAP