Soccer: Malaysian warm-up off All Whites' menu

By TERRY MADDAFORD

The unavailability of key players has forced All Whites coach Ken Dugdale to scrap his plans to hold a second World Cup warm-up match in Asia.

The match against Singapore will go ahead at the national stadium on May 22 as earlier planned, but a second game against Malaysia has been canned.

"We have a few problems over player availability," New Zealand Soccer chief executive Bill MacGowan said yesterday.

"Without a full squad [of 20] Ken Dugdale could see little point in going ahead with a second match."

He said New Zealand Soccer had been advised that Ryan Nelsen (DC United) and Simon Elliott (LA Galaxy) would be required for MLS games and Ivan Vicelich was needed at Roda in Holland until May 27.

Vaughan Coveny would not be released by South Melbourne until they were out of the NSL playoffs (the final is scheduled for June 3) and Danny Hay had yet to confirm his World Cup availability.

Dugdale will meet Hay in Leeds this week and will name his 20-strong World Cup squad after that.

About 15 players, from the original 32-man squad, will go to Singapore where they will assemble over the weekend of May 19 and 20.

"They will return to New Zealand and play two matches, probably against combined federation teams," MacGowan said.

"These matches are scheduled for May 28 in Wanganui against federations four and five and in Auckland, possibly at North Harbour Stadium, against federations one and two on May 31."