Dave Passmore's lads came from two goals down to secure a rare victory over the world's best team, a sign that preparations are going well.

The Irish, who travelled to Germany without their Pembroke contingent - who were in Prague chalking up a Eurohockey Champions Club Trophy success - had lost 3-0 in the first of the two internationals on Saturday afternoon.

Their inability to defend penalty corners cost them dear, and the head coach wasn't amused at what he described as a poor performance, even though the players were coming off virtually a month's break.

It seemed yesterday's game was going the same way when the Germans took a two goal lead, but the Irish threw caution to the wind and in a thrilling finish their attacking style was rewarded with three goals in the last 17 minutes.

The Germans opened the scoring in 33 minutes when Fritz Montang converted a penalty corner and four minutes into the second half goalkeeper Iain Walker made a superb save from another German penalty corner, only to see Sebastian Draghun convert the rebound.

But in the 53rd minute university student Michael Watt - the former Instonian now playing with Grange in Scotland - converted a penalty corner rebound.

Eight minutes later Banbridge's Eugene Magee won Ireland another penalty corner, which was converted by Stephen Butler to level affairs.

The last five minutes saw Ireland push forward at every opportunity and their attacking style paid off when awarded two penalty corners in the last minute.

Butler's initial drag flick was blocked, but the Glenanne midfielder showed quick reactions to make no mistake on the rebound to give his team an unexpected win over the world's top team.

There were 10 Ulster men in the squad which was captained by Instonians' Patrick Brown.

"It was a pleasing win after Saturday's disappointing display," admitted Passmore afterwards.

"But we have to be more aggressive and positive at the start of matches so that we don't have to continually chase the game. Hopefully we can pick up from here at the Setanta Sports Trophy next month in Dublin."

The Irish will face Canada and Egypt, who are both ranked higher than them in the world, and also Wales in the new series which will take place from June 13 to 17, and Passmore sees this as another good test for his team ahead of the Manchester showpiece in August.

Meanwhile Pembroke recovered from their first day defeat in the Eurohockey Club Champions Trophy in Prague to win all their remaining games and finish as one of the two winners.

The Dublin side lost their opening game against Russian side Dinamo Kazan 4-1, but bounced back and chalked up wins over Slovakians Liva Lipovci (5-1) and Belarussians Stroitel Brest (4-2) to finish second in their pool.

In their crossover game they beat the other pool winners, Rotweiss Wettingen from Switzerland, 5-3 on penalties after the game finished 2-2.