Soccer: All Whites on a mission to find cup warm-up games

By TERRY MADDAFORD

New Zealand Soccer is looking to South America and Asia in the search for vital World Cup warm-up matches.

The decision to pull the All Whites out of the Millennium Cup - being played in India - has left the side short on international match play in the build-up to their cup qualifiers in June.

"Our first priority is the Merdeka Cup in Malaysia, if it is played at the right time and if we are invited back as defending champions," New Zealand Soccer chief executive Bill MacGowan said yesterday.

If that were not possible, or the cup was played too late, All Whites coach Ken Dugdale was keen to take the team to South America for three matches.

"We have already sent faxes to Paraguay, Uruguay and Chile requesting games," MacGowan said.

"We have had a good relationship with these countries at full international and age-group levels. We are hopeful we can arrange three matches in a 10-day tour.

"If we don't have any luck there - and, like us, they have World Cup matches scheduled in June - we are looking at Japan and Korea, because they will be building towards the Confederations Cup."

Dugdale has drawn up a provisional list of 30 players.

The Australian-based World Cup qualifying group, which includes Tonga, Samoa, Fiji and American Samoa, will be played in April.

The second pool, based in Auckland and including Tahiti, Solomon Islands, Vanuatu and the Cook Islands, will begin on June 4. New Zealand's first game will be two days later.

"We have been told by Oceania that all matches must be played in the afternoon because it will be too cold at that time of the year for night games," said MacGowan. "That is a bit ironic, given the situation in the club championship in Papua New Guinea, where Napier have been forced to play in the heat of the day."

The first of the crossover games between the pool winners - likely to be Australia and New Zealand - will, if the All Whites win through, be played in New Zealand on June 24, in either Auckland or Wellington.

"We have an obligation to take the All Whites around the country, but there are a number of issues we have to be aware of," said MacGowan.

"They last played in Wellington in 1992, but for the World Cup game against Australia four years ago we had 22,000 at North Harbour Stadium, which we still regard as the home of football."

The Oceania winner in World Cup qualifying will play the fourth-placed South American team at home and away for a place in next year's finals in Japan and Korea.

The tournament will be the third international involvement for New Zealand Soccer this year.

The national under-20 side assemble on February 4 before playing their first Oceania qualifying match in Noumea, New Caledonia, on February 8.

The overseas-based players - Chris Killen, David Mulligan, Darren Young, David Rayner and Jeremy Christie - will join their team-mates after a stop-off in Sydney.

Again, the pool winners will play home and away, with the first game in New Zealand (if the national side is involved) on February 28 at a venue which is yet to be confirmed.

The Oceania under-20 winner qualifies directly for the finals in Argentina.

The under-17s, whose 18-man squad is likely to be named next week, assemble on March 17 and fly to Vanuatu on the same day for a week's acclimatisation before their Oceania qualifying tournament starts on March 23.

The pool winners will again play home and away. If that is a transtasman battle, the Australians will host the first game in Sydney on April 4. The return match, likely to be in Auckland, is four days later.

The winner qualifies directly for the world championships in Trinidad and Tobago on a date yet to be confirmed.