The Australian Steelers, as they are nicknamed, have announced a 12-strong squad for the tournament at the Morningside Arena in the English city between Feburary 21 and 24. 

Along with host nation Great Britain, ranked fourth in the world, the Steelers will also face the United States, the number two side, who beat them in their previous encounter last October at the World Wheelchair Rugby Challenge gold medal match in Tokyo.

Between them, Australia and the US have won four of the gold medals since wheelchair rugby became part of the Paralympic Games programme at Sydney 2000.

The US won at Sydney 2000 and Beijing 2008.

Australia have won the last two gold medals at London 2012 and Rio 2016. 

"They're not handing out Paralympic Games gold medals at Quad Nations, so we don't want to peak too early this year, but at the same time, we're aiming to perform at an extremely high standard over there and continue to make progress towards achieving our ultimate goal later this year," Steelers head coach Brad Dubberley said. 

"Momentum heading into the Paralympics is really important and that’s what we want to build in Leicester. 

"We want to get our year off to the right start."

Developing the Steelers’ depth will be a focus for Dubberley, who revealed he will look to emerging talents Shae Graham, Richard Voris, Josh Nicholson and Jake Howe to play more prominent roles at this tournament. 

All four are aiming to make their Paralympic debuts this year.

"We have some players that still need to experience court time in really big games," Dubberley said.

"It's likely that about half our team will be going to their first Paralympic Games in Tokyo and some of those athletes haven't played big minutes against our toughest opponents,

"We want these athletes to know that they belong in the international environment and there is a reason why they are in our squad and in contention to make our team for Tokyo.

"I'm really looking forward to getting over there and ripping in. 

"It will give us a good indication of how we are progressing towards Tokyo and I'm excited to really fine-tune the game plans, philosophies that we want to employ and achieve during the Paralympics."