Bhubaneswar, June 22: Five Odia girls have made their way into the national women's hockey squad for the upcoming Hockey World League Semi Final that will travel to South Africa for the event, adding another feather to the state's glorious history of supplying players to Indian team.

The competition will take place between July 8 and 23 in Johannesburg.

Hockey India announced the 18-member squad on Wednesday. Striker Rani Rampal will captain the team in South Africa, while defender P. Sushila Chanu will be her deupty.

Defenders Deep Grace Ekka and Sunita Lakra will be the backbone of the Indian team, while Namita Toppo and Lilima Minz will be tasked with game-making duties from midfield. Anupa Barla will be among the forwards.

Hailing from the tribal-dominated Sundargarh district, Deep Grace Ekka has been a consistent performer for the national team since making her debut. She led the junior Indian women's hockey team to New Zealand for a six-match test series last year.

The players are aiming for a positive result at the Hockey World League Semi-Final, which is a qualifying tournament for the Women's World Cup in London next year.

"We are training hard and hope to put up a good effort as a whole," Ekka said.

Lakra is among the more experienced members of the squad with over 50 international matches to her credit. She made her international debut in 2009 and, since then, has taken part in several memorable matches for the Blues.

"Miss Dependable" Minz has 74 international matches and 6 goals to her credit and is one of the star players of the team. She was part of the contingent that made history by winning the bronze medal for the first time in the Women's Junior Hockey World Cup in Germany in 2013.

A product of the Panposh Sports Hostel in Rourkela, Toppo has already showed signs of her mettle quite early in her career and the team expects the Sundargarh resident to deliver in crunch matches.

India has been placed in Pool B alongside Argentina, South Africa, Chile and the United States in what can be called the Group of Death in the tournament. They will begin their campaign against South Africa on July 8. Ahead of their departure at the end of this month, the squad will train for a week in Delhi.

The Indian eves will be not be carrying form into the tournament, having suffered a 0-5 series whitewash in their previous tour of New Zealand.

In another development, five boys from Sundargarh have been named among 33 probables for the national junior hockey squad for the Junior Hockey World Cup in 2020.

These players will now be trained and take part in all upcoming tournaments. These budding players are goalkeeper Pankaj Kumar Rajak, forwards Shilanand Lakra and Jai Prakash Patel, and full-backs Pratap Lakra and Suman Bag.