who thinks the All whites should arrange a friendly with one of the four qualified South American teams before the playoff in June like with Brazil or Argentina?. CONMEBOL are free during that period. UEFA and CONCACAF are not due to nations league
Yipe a good idea. May depend who CONCACAF opponent is. Could be USA or Canada, and maybe they are both setup more like a European team?? Or like Socceroos??
But yeah playoff game (if AWs win through OFC tourney) is June 13th or 14th.
So hopefully NZF can organise a tough friendly late May/early June after Euro club seasons are finished. Like a top 50 FIFA ranked type opponent.
AWs have played (or will play in January) teams ranked what 80-120 odd. All of whom you would think are likely a step down in quality from that 4th ranked CONCACAF team. So some danger that playing Panama, Costa Rica, Canada or whoever could be sudden shock in standard.
Back in 2017, AWs had Russia, Mexico & Portugal at Confeds Cup. Then a friendly in Japan. All good prep for Peru. You'd think they ideally need a similar real tough game 1-2 weeks prior 13th-14th June.
What maybe a problem, is if the finish to the Euro club seasons is extended into June, with lots of club games now being postponed due to Covid.