It doesn’t matter how you win, a win is a win, and NZ won, they are through, I was right.
Period.

Still can’t swallow that pill?

At least everyone else stopped attacking me over the issue since NZ won. Strange you continue to.

Oh well, victory is sweet.

“It doesn’t matter if you win by an inch or a mile, winning is winning.” – Vin Diesel.

The omission for this tie of Steven Old, who plays for Kilmarnock in the SPL, is a mystery. He can play right back, where Herbert instead preferred to select Aaron Scott for the current squad – he is an amateur player in the NZFC. It’s true that Herbert also elected not to play with a genuine right back in these ties, so that he could have 3 up front. But it’s still not clear why Old was ignored altogether, especially given that amateur players were chosen instead.

I’m not sure if Old can replace Vicelich (who played left-side defence), but I agree he should come into the squad.

Chris Wood will definitely remain in the squad. He is only 17, he plays for West Brom in the Championship (having had game time in the EPL last year), and he impressed most NZ pundits with his impact off the bench in the first leg in Manama. If nothing else he will be in South Africa as an investment for the future. But probably he will be more than that and will continue to get game time off the bench.

Poor countries don’t spend lots of money on sports like we do and usually have corrupt officials and administrators.

China is good at a heap of sports, particularly at the Olympics, such as diving, gymnastics. But how many of these have mass appeal, nothing comes close to futbol in China. The only sport which could come close is basketball, mainly to Yao Ming, who is more globally well known than any Chinese futbol player.

It is estimated that there are over 350m Manchester United supporters in China. How many Chinese follow swimming and athletics?

I remember reading that table tennis is the 2nd most popular sport in the world simply due to the fact it’s popular in china. Playing table tennis in China is like playing backyard cricket in Australia. Basketball is popular, badminton, squash, swimming, gymnastic, athletics etc.

As shown by the olympics. CHina are good at diverse range of sports. to say that football is the only sport with any following is plain wrong.

However saying that, few reasons why China aren’t doing so well I think corruption is the main one especially when there’s talk about match fixing. people then lose faith in their own national league. Also most Chinese people love EPL but don’t like their own club team. I think the average crowds for a CSL game is about 15k or so. Not bad but it’s pretty small considering the population of the country. In any case, knowing a few people from mainland china, they have very little respect for their own team and they think their national sides is a joke.

And perhaps not political since Nth Korea did better than China (but that is just one campaign).

Perhaps Chinese dads dream of their kid becoming rich so send them to school while Brazilian dads dream fo their kids scoring 90th minute winners.

I don’t think it’s physicality because China and Japan are so much better than China.

Im sure there are probably hundreds of millions of registered players in China and Indonesia, and Im sure every Chinese male plays futbol at some stage.

I think its a fair call to compare Indonesia to Brazil, many of Brazils best have come out of favelas which would be akin to the slums of Indonesia, both nations have massive populations, futbol is the sporting behemoth in both nations. Yet Brazil are perhaps the nation most associated with futbol and are historically dominant, whereas Indonesia have nowhere near the credentials.

Of course Australia generally has a better lifestyle than England, one only has to see the physiques down at Blackpool to make that assessment!!

It’s easier to compare England vs Australia and see that there is an obvious disparity there. Their Football team is better but not by enough to really make up for their Rugby, league, Olympic and Cricket teams not being as good.

Shows that lifestyle and the way grass roots sport is organized is perhaps a big part of it. I think most Australian football codes have a clear ladder of Club then Regional side then District side then State Side then National side.

Highly unlikely we will play against each other in the group stages and depending on the draw, will be very hard for either of us to progress beyond the group stages.

The complaints have already started that the “best” teams didn’t make it to the WC and how do teams like Australia and NZ get into a WC ahead of others.
Sure, I’d rather play Bahrain than France or Russia or Portugal to get there.

But how do you determine the best 32 football nations who “deserve” to be in a WC?
How many WC spots should Asia and Oceania get?

it really speaks volume about the futbolling ability of nations like China and Indonesia, where they have massive populations, with millions of registered players and where futbol is the only sport with any following, fail to qualify, whereas in New Zealand, rugby, cricket, league, netball and motor sports would generally have more interest.

And the FFA is glad they’re in Asia, if anything else, they now have more meaningful games, as opposed to one game every four years = more $$$.

The trade off is that they got less preperation.

Australia used to be in the same boat and I don’t many Australian football fans regret moving away from relying on a playoff to qualify.

As I said the last time you wrote an article about this, its never right to be dismissive of your opponents. The All Whites could have won by five goals and you still wouldn’t have been vindicated.

As it was they relied on poor finishing in the first leg and a botched penalty in the second to get through.

I’m very glad to see New Zealand in the World Cup and I now have a second team to cheer for, but whatever the outcome your original article was still a disgrace.

Congrats to them making it, but NZ will play 3 much higher ranked, better credentialled teams than Bahrain in Sth Africa –

Just a reminder of what NZ achieved in Spain in ‘82
Scotland 5 – NZ 2
USSR 3 – NZ 0
Brazil 4 – NZ 0

Lets assume Uruguay beats Costa Rica over 2 legs.

Pot 1: Sth Africa + top 7 seeds (5 Europe, 2 Sth American)
Pot 2: Europe unseeded

Pot 3 and 4 will contain:
4 Asian
1 Oceanic
3 Sth American unseeded
3 Nth American
5 African

Basically they must be split into 2 groups of 8 somehow.

I expect African + Sth/Nth American in 1 pot
Oceania, Asia + Nth/Sth American in the other
ie. Aus and NZ will share a pot, so will be in different groups.

I find it very unlikely that NZ will make it out of the group stage, if they do, and Australia also does, it would be a 1 in 15 chance that we will be paired up in the round of 16.

Appreciate any corrections if I’m wrong!