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Thursday 2 June 2016

Trying to rationalise the existence of NZ Football and Oceania

After a longish time away from FIFA sanctioned football, we see our A Team (aka All Whites) competing (away) in international games at that. This tournament features key players in the OFC and given past tournaments, maybe not so easy to win.

It seems it's been some time since All Whites won anything of note, and their run in the 2010 FIFA World Cup is now well and truly a distant memory.  Sadly the rankings have slipped markedly along with that lack of foreign competition, especially on the home front. So what happened to the millions (in US $$) made from being the only unbeaten team in that WC?

To be honest it's not that hard to find.  A revamped Senior Mens Domestic competition.  Womens International programme, and youth tournaments.  A majority of those (excepting Domestic) have had a lot of international competition. At the expense of Mens All White campaign!  Yes our womens and youth partake in great competitions, but the shop window for our Football is the All Whites.  And the All Whites are not being catered for, contrary to the football available to both WC campaigns in the past.

One great thing to foster better calibre football is a football Chappell/Hadlee series, 3 matches home and away with Australia.  If that is possible, then you might just draw other international sides (Asia) down here with regular internationals.  We'd still be under OFC.  Yes talk is about NZF joining Asia but I doubt FIFA will let us go, citing competition amongst the islands and our ability to raise the quality of football, especially given our ranking now a mere 10 points clear of the nearest OFC country (a very weak position to barter from).

I like us in OFC, I don't like us not being seen on home pitches.  If they miss the boat now (NZ Football) then the future is a shipwreck that can never again be refloated.

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