The All Whites are taking what’s effectively a second-string squad to a tournament in which they’re the lowest ranked team… but how would you react to the suggestion that the All Whites should beat all three of these teams over in Mumbai?
Mark Rudan, aye? He’s not the romantic choice but hands were pretty tied on this one. There are no available local candidates and it was never ideal to ask Fritz Schmid or one of that lot to double up on jobs.
Now that the fog has lifted somewhat, it’s clear enough that we will at least have one more Wellington Phoenix season to get excited about. And you never know what might happen with one fluke season.
Clean sheet, three points, soon to be the temporary captain… this was a good week for Mikey Boxall. No wonder he didn’t have time to check twitter for the updates, having to rely on his barber for the news…
This one had a little bit of all those things that supposedly define the big matches. We had injury heartbreak with Mo Salah and Dani Carvajal. We had injury redemption with Gareth Bale.
You know, there’s nothing wrong with picking an inexperienced team. Just want to make that clear in case there are people out there yapping about cheapening the jersey or whatever.
Safe to say that it’ll come as no spoiler that there are City players littered throughout these teams of the season, particularly that illustrious first team.
Check this out, then. Barcelona turned up in South Africa just like they said they would and put on a show for a massive crowd at FNB Stadium in Soweto… Jeremy Brockie, of Nelson, New Zealand, got to play against Lionel Messi and the lads.
They were always going to be lifting the trophy after what they did last week. Team Wellington are too good of a team to be complacent enough to blow this with so much on the line… and besides, after a 6-0 win in the first leg the margins for error were pretty enormous.
Safe to say this squad announcement was overshadowed pretty much everywhere by the situation going on with Abby Erceg’s re-retirement… everywhere except in NZ Football’s announcement which barely even acknowledged Erceg.
Heaps of talking points from the latest Football Ferns squad which has been announced for the friendly against Japan next month. The fact that the game is taking place in Wellington is one of them, as is the quality of the opposition…
Yeah, nah, Woody was all good to play against Bournemouth. Not only that but he broke the goal scoring stalemate in the most poacher way possible – purposefully deflecting a teammate’s shot into the net to score the goal for himself.
The idea that a professional club could split its home games between two different cities in two different countries, with two different fan-bases, wearing two different home strips, is potentially the dumbest compromise since Abraham Lincoln promised his wife a trip to the theatre.
Team Wellington have never been to a Club World Cup (only Auckland City and Waitakere have ever represented Aotearoa there) and they were clearly pumped up for this one, not about to let it slip like Stevie G.
Depends who you ask, to be honest. There are large portions of fans from five other top six teams who’d make a pretty virulent argument that The Red Devils aren’t getting much credit on account of how trash they’re playing.
Riddo missed just one game last season, only Goran Paracki played more minutes. It was a breakout season for the 22 year old having spent several years on the fringes waiting for his chance and when he finally got it he thrived.
Michael Boxall versus Stefan Marinovic, a couple essential figures at the back for the All Whites but rivals on the field over in the MLS… especially with Mikey facing up against his old employers. So which one of them clung on to a rare clean sheet?
The Football Ferns are coming home! They’re gonna play Japan in Wellington on 10 June, a rare dip into local waters and hopefully resounding proof of how far this team has come over the last few years.
Do you know who the next Wellington Phoenix manager is going to be? Can you drop a mate a line if you do, maybe get TNC that big scoop? Help some independent kiwi media battlers catch a break?
Three straight defeats including the rock bottom 6-0 loss last week and Big Stef and the Whitecaps were in dire need of a result to get things back on track. And, oh look, they got one. A 2-0 win over Real Salt Lake.