Transtasman rivals pose huge hurdle to Black Sticks' Olympic hopes

Simon Child.

Should New Zealand miss out on a place at the Rio Olympics next year, they'll need to take a hard look in the mirror at events in the past few days.

Their failure to make the top four at the World League semifinal in Buenos Aires has left the men's Black Sticks vulnerable, with only the Oceania Cup tournament in Stratford in October as a direct route to Rio.

There, they'll have the sizeable task of beating world No 1 Australia to qualify as confederation champions. They did beat the Aussies this year to win the Azlan Shah tournament in Malaysia, on a penalty shootout, but generally Australia have held significant sway.

Since the start of 2010, the transtasman rivals have met 17 times. Australia have won 13, New Zealand 2 - in Malaysia in April and a 3-0 win in Hobart in the Oceania Cup in 2011 - with the other two drawn.

Olympic hockey qualification is a convoluted business. The 12 Olympic spots are allocated to the top three teams at each of two World League tournaments, plus the five confederation winners, with one spare, which ordinarily would go to the hosts Brazil, except their world ranking of 37 is too low.

However, there will be double ups. For example, Germany and the Netherlands are through from the World League event, but there's a good chance that one of those two nations, world ranked 3 and 2 respectively, will qualify as European champions, thus opening up a further spot. Ditto the Pan American section.

Should Australia win the Oceania title, the Black Sticks could still make Rio, but they will be entirely dependent on events out of their control, which no one enjoys. World rankings will be adjusted after the second World League event starting in Antwerp this weekend.

If one spot is remaining it will be decided by the world rankings of the two teams who have finished in the final relevant place at the two tournaments. New Zealand are ranked seventh and might stay there at the next ranking reckoning.

But in Buenos Aires, they could have sealed the deal.

They lost a penalty shootout 8-7, after 28 shots, to Canada, ranked eight places lower, after a scoreless draw; then were well beaten by Spain, four places behind them, in their last game yesterday morning, in which Spain deserved their 3-1 win.

If in a few months they have missed out on Rio, New Zealand will have only themselves to blame.

The women's Black Sticks, ranked fourth, start their Rio campaign in Antwerp on Saturday.