I wonder if NZ Football are now having second thoughts about not making an application to host the tournament?
More than anything, I'm pissed off that we've just given the football knockers another piece of ammunition (who will be the first media person to take a shot at the Halberg Award?). I'll be at the first home World Cup qualifier, but i wonder how many people that switched onto NZ Football at the Bahrain games will? This could have more of an impact than just not going to Brazil next year.
But after watching our first three games, it's not really a shock - we've looked disjointed from the start and failed to really dominate any of the games we've played, despite scoring early goals in the first three. For all our of supposed attacking weapons, we've scored just 4 goals in 4 games. To me, Rojas doesn't look up to international football yet and I'm not sure that Barbarouses has really earned the right to be an automatic first pick. And as for Gleeson...was anyone else having Jason Batty flashbacks every time he had the ball at his feet?
Interesting that 3-4-3 worked well when all we were expected to do was get bodies behind the ball and hold on (Bahrain, World Cup), but it's been a complete failure as soon as we've been in games that we had to win and where we'd be expected to dictate proceedings. Time to find a right back and give them the nod for the next 12 months
Putting an impartial hat on, I think it's great for Oceania football and best of luck to either Tahiti or New Caledonia in Brazil next year...given our recent results against El Salvador and Honduras, maybe Oceania football isn't as bad as we think.
Dunedin in September for our first home World Cup qualifier sounds like a good response to having to play in 35 degrees.