When Australia departed Oceania in 2006 to join the Asian confederation in the hope that playing more competitive sides that would make the nation stronger, It left behind the other continental powerhouse, New Zealand, who have ruled the roost in the region ever since.
However, the All Whites’ domination of Oceania might end within the next decade, as a small island nation more synonymous with rugby has a talented crop of young footballers all coming through at the same time.
Fiji has never been known as a football country. It sits at a lowly 165th in the world rankings.
They have, however, produced some very good footballers over the years. Who can forget Esala Masi as a star player for the Wollongong Wolves during the last years of the NSL, or in recent times Roy Krishna’s spell at Wellington Phoenix, where he was a regular goal scorer?
There is a new group of Fijian footballers hoping to emulate the success of Masi and Krishna.
The under-19s men’s national team are currently in a training camp in preparation for August’s OFC U-19 Championship, which is being held in Samoa
Two of the 11 sides competing will earn automatic qualification to the 2023 FIFA U-20 World Cup being held in Indonesia.
New Zealand is the firm favourite to win the tournament, but Fiji will look to replicate its performance in 2014 and cause an upset.
Coach Bal Reddy’s squad will have representatives who play their club football in Fiji, New Zealand, Australia, America and England
Goalkeeper Aydin Mustahib has recently joined Auckland United FC, and big things are expected of the talented 18-year-old gloveman
Aiden Fong is a right-back capable of playing as a winger due to his endurance. He currently calls the Rocky Mountains of Vancouver home, playing for the Whitecaps under-17s side.
(Photo By Stephen McCarthy/Sportsfile via Getty Images)
On the opposite side is Kris Naicker of the University of Central Arkansas. He’s an ex-Wellington Phoenix youth team player and has also represented New Zealand at the FIFA U-17 World Cup, but it appears he’s changed allegiance to Fiji.
Peter Ravai was once a much-heralded youth prospect who played for Hamburg in Germany but is now with Maidstone United’s under-23s side.
Josh Laqeretabua is a 16-year-old involved with Charlton Athletic’s under-18s side.
I’ve spoken about Mustafa Mohammed on The Roar before. He’s a midfielder in Brisbane Roar’s under-18 team.
He’s a technically gifted player who was a regular goalscorer at junior level and could potentially make his senior debut for Brisbane Roar in the upcoming season
Combative midfielder Abdullah Aiyas is playing for the Bonnyrigg White Eagles under-20s side in the NSW NPL and has been heavily monitored by A-League clubs.
Malakai Love Semira has found the back of net multiple times already this season for Peninsula Power in the Queensland NPL.
Oliver McFadyen is a very direct attacking player capable of scoring goals, as seen with his time at English lower league club Stockport County FC.
Then there’s the prolific junior striker Marcus Lal, who’s coming off a great season with Manly United in the NSW NPL.
It’s an interesting collection of players who on paper could cause a lot of damage at the OFC U-19 Championship in Samoa, but as we all know, matches are won on the field rather than on the blackboard.
New Zealand should still lift the trophy, but if they get too far ahead of themselves, the dark horses for the tournament, Fiji are more than capable of pulling off a miracle
But then again, they might lose every game – such is the unpredictability with the smaller Pacific nations when it comes to football in Oceania.
Regardless, this Fiji under-19s side has people talking, and that’s only a good thing. The next step is to go from easybeats to contenders.
Grem
Roar Rookie
Great article Secret Scout - hopefully they develop and hopefully a few A League gemd come out way.
Tia Roko
Roar Rookie
Great read!
NoMates
Roar Rookie
Fiji went to the Olympics where they beat Honduras. I wouldn't be surprised if they do the upset over NZ.
Aman Pillay
Guest
Kris Naicker is not eligible for the Under 19s as he is 2002 born
Towser
Guest
Approximately 40 years ago from memory I was in Fiji on Holiday. In Lautoka I spotted a group of lads training. My football curiosity took over and I wandered over to have a look. The standard didn’t seem too bad from a casual glance of ball control, passing accuracy etc. After a while they finished training and one lad(of Indian descent as indicated by Brainstrust)wandered over and had a chat. We talked about English football( of which he was very knowledgeable) and then we( as I had indicated I lived in Australia) talked about the comparison of Fijian and Australian football. Bottom line similar stories, lack of funding to develop the game was the main issue. Whilst Australia is somewhat better than those days regarding moolah, it’s still nowhere near enough. However I doubt whether Fiji has still got much more money in its football coffers generated locally as 40 years ago. Always been loads of potential in the Pacific islands IMO, hopefully the FIFA money, also mentioned by Brainstrust helps.
Franko
Guest
Don't forget Timmy Cahill in all this!
Brainstrust
Roar Rookie
Fiji has always been strong in football, and have beaten Australia in the past, the difference between rugby and football is that football is played by the Indian population as well who tend to avoid rugby. Arnold played in the loss to Fiji in 1988 the first leg of a world cup qualifier, of course the tropical heat was the factor in Australia's defeat. Something Arnold never learnt from either, luckily Qatar and their air conditioned stadium stepped in. Rankings of 160 dont exist in other sports, but in football you will still have a local professional or semi professional league at that ranking. Indonesia have 2 division of professional clubs at that ranking and are being talked about as the destination for Tom Rogic. Fiji are one of the strong teams in the Pacific, the traditional strong teams are Solomon Islands, New Caledonia, Tahiti , Vanauta, now PNG have joined them and they also have the richest local league now. FIFA is giving even more money to each national association which means that the minnows have more cash to spend on their national team, it wont make any difference to a lot of countries but it will impact in the Pacific. In the past the Pacifics best locally developed player Karembeu went to represent France and he wasn't the only one. Now international football is becoming more about genealogy than local development in many cases, we saw Stanjic applauded by many after he replaced his whole national squad with American born players with Phillipine heritage that went through the USA college system. Of course every country except Brazil and Argentina has been doing this since the start of world cups, first cab off the rank was Italy in 1934, now the minnows with a bit more money from FIFA can join in. Is this a revolution , maybe in genealogy but not football.
Nick Symonds
Guest
It's good to see that things are developing in the pacific islands, but a pity this article was placed lower down with older articles.
Franko
Guest
Esali Masi, thats taking me back, what a wonderful footballer. Morwell gave him the platform back when we had a 14 team comp including Wollongong and Canberra. Crowds were horrible but plenty of players got a shot.