Soccer: Promising opening to Games qualifiers

By Bob Pearce

A burst of four goals in seven minutes fired New Zealand's bid for a place at the Sydney Olympic soccer competition off to a promising start yesterday.

The barrage five minutes after halftime allowed the under-23 team to beat Vanuatu 4-0 in their first Olympic qualifier at Bill McKinlay Park, Mt Wellington.

It rather wiped away the memory of a scoreless first half where the New Zealanders dominated the early exchanges but could not score and then surrendered the initiative to their unheralded opponents.

New Zealand had seven overseas-based players in their starting XI, and the lack of matchplay together was very evident early on.

Ryan Nelsen and Joshua Stick controlled the defence, but the midfield failed to capitalise on Vanuatu's early stagefright and up front Jeff Campbell and Mathew Urlovic both missed good scoring opportunities.

When Campbell and Kris Bouckenooghe were on target goalkeeper Samson Lini pulled off a couple of brilliant saves.

Five minutes into the second half Bouckenooghe broke the drought after Nelsen split the defence. Three minutes later Urlovic made it 2-0 from close range.

Vanuatu had the chance to reduce the deficit after a clumsy challenge by Gareth Rowe conceded a penalty, but Richard Iwai blasted the spot kick wide.

Joe Murray made it 3-0 with his first touch as a replacement in the 56th minute and Noah Hickey completed the scoring a minute later when he buried a rebound after his shot was blocked by Lini.

On Saturday in the other qualifying group Solomons beat Tonga 7-0 and Fiji scored four goals in the second half to run away from a plucky Samoan team 4-0.

Today at Bill McKinlay Park Solomons play Samoa at 5.45 pm and Fiji meet Tonga at 8 pm. Papua New Guinea make their debut against Vanuatu at the same venue tomorrow. New Zealand play Papua New Guinea on Thursday.