INTERNATIONAL ROUNDUP

INTERNATIONAL ROUNDUP

The club campaign may have reached its conclusion, but for a number of our players, holidays will need to be put on hold as they head off to represent their respective nations in the upcoming international matches.

The Confederations Cup begins in Brazil on 15 June, and Luiz Felipe Scolari's side will warm up for the tournament with a couple of attractive friendly games.

David Luiz and Oscar will be part of the Brazil squad which takes on England at the Maracana on Sunday 2 June, while a week later they face France at the same venue.

Ashley Cole will captain England tonight when they take on Republic of Ireland at Wembley in the first meeting between the sides since 1995. Cole will lead the team out to mark him reaching 100 caps in February's game against Brazil, while Gary Cahill and Frank Lampard will also hope to be involved.

Having clinched the Africa Cup of Nations back in January, Nigeria will also play in the Confederations Cup, and their squad, which includes John Mikel Obi and Kenneth Omeruo, prepare for the competition with matches against Mexico, Kenya and Namibia.

Having recently earned his 100th cap with Czech Republic, Petr Cech will be confident of starting in their match against Italy on Friday in Prague, while Yossi Benayoun's Israel play Honduras in America.

Eden Hazard, meanwhile, will hope to have recovered from injury in time to represent Belgium against USA tonight, before potentially coming up against Branislav Ivanovic and his Serbia side on Friday 7 June.

Hazard is joined in the Belgium squad for the first time by his younger brother, Thorgan, who has been rewarded for his impressive form while on loan at Zulte Waregem.

Thibaut Courtois, Romelu Lukaku and Kevin De Bruyne make up the Chelsea contingent in Marc Wilmots's squad.

Of our younger players, Josh McEachran is currently away at a training camp with England Under-21s ahead of the European Championships in Israel which begin on Sunday. He will be joined later this week by Nathaniel Chalobah.

Patrick van Aanholt, meanwhile, has been named in the Dutch squad for the tournament after an impressive season on loan at Vitesse. They open their campaign against Germany on 6 June.

Milan Lalkovic will hope to be involved when Slovakia Under-21s face Israel tonight, while they also meet Luxembourg on Thursday 11 June.

Lamisha Musonda is part of the Belgium squad who will participate in the Toulon Under-21 tournament. They face Brazil in their first game tonight.

Qualification for the Under-19 European Championships continues with the Elite Round, and Nathan Ake's Netherlands side face games against Norway, Cyprus and Germany.

Another player involved in the process is Andreas Christensen, fresh from his involvement with the first team last week in the US. His Denmark side face Czech Republic on Tuesday 4 June before taking on Portugal two days later.

Blues duo Lewis Baker and John Swift will be hoping to inspire England to a much-needed victory over Scotland in Belgium, and they will be in direct competition with Alex Davey and Islam Feruz, who are both part of the Scotland squad.