Pacific Games (2019)

The draw was made a few days ago.

What tournament is this? New nations cup?

Its the Pacific games - you know the one NZ went to a couple of years ago in PNG and got disqualified because they read the wrong set of rules

Are we the only country entering an U23 team?

The Pacific Games is like the Olympics but for the Pacific – like the African, Asian Games, European Games Pan-American Games – featuring a whole host of sports.

Traditionally Australia and New Zealand haven't taken part, but that was relaxed in some instances where it wouldn't ruin the competitive balance in 2015.

In 2015, the Pacific Games were also used as OFC's Olympic qualifying tournament, so it was under-23 teams taking part, including the ill-fated New Zealand one (that was eliminated as a result of theDeklan Wynne eligiblity saga, with Fiji going to Rio).

Traditionally it's been a senior tournament, with bragging rights in the Pacific at stake.

This year New Zealand Football sought to enter an under-23 team alongside the senior sides from the Pacific (the likes of David Browne, Micah Lea'alafa, Tommy Semmy are all taking part) in order to prepare domestic players for OFC Olympic qualifying tournament in Fiji in September, as the timing of both tournaments makes access to college players and professional players very difficult.

Hopefully we will soon get an idea of who's going to be involved.

Not aligned with international windows I assume. Does Ufuk know he’s going to lose half his squad?

A league not stopping for international windows next season but looks like dates are 7 July - 23 July. So out of A league season anyway. 

That's pretty soon. When are NZF going to announce a squad.

Oops missed that, but September tournament timing will be interesting. 

I'm not sure any Wellington Phoenix players will be involved in the Pacific Games. I'd expect a squad announcement next week or the week after.

I had missed that they'd announced the A-League will start on October 11. With the OFC qualifiers ending October 5, I'd say no Phoenix pros will be involved.

Yipe that OFC Olympic qualifying tourney (U23s) runs 21 September – 5 October 2019, which pretty much overlaps every pro club comp on the globe.

I note in another article James Mcgarry has ruled himself out.

Even the American USL season runs to weekend of October 18–20 (so no Adams & Brotherton - both age 22).

Presumably no A League players.  

So just a team of Handy Prem players & USA college boys. 

Tzanev, Zwetsloot, Van Hoven, Stanger, Mata from Europe maybe as just youth players at their Euro clubs. Will be a vulnerable side no matter what.

Last time tourney was played in July 2015, looks like OFC doing NZ no favours again.

Adams, Brotherton and Tzanev are all too old. This under-23 cycle is for players born January 1, 1997 and later.

Here is a list of 66 players who either went to the 2019 or 2017 Fifa U-20 World Cups or were involved in the final camps before those tournaments or went to the 2018 or 2016 OFC U-19/U-20 Championships. Those in italics can go again for the 2024 Olympics.

6 Goalkeepers

Cam Brown, Josh Dijkstra, Zac Jones, Keegan Smith, Conor Tracey, Michael Woud

24 Defenders

Jorge Akers, Hunter Ashworth, Dino Botica, Liberato Cacace, Reese Cox, Boyd Curry, Stafford Dowling, Callan Elliot, Dane Ingham, Luke Johnson, Josh Jones, Kelvin Kalua, Sean Liddicoat, James McGarry, Hayden McHenery, Nando Pijnaker, Jordan Spain, George Stanger, Rob Tipelu, Emlyn Wellsmore, Dalton Wilkins, Liam Williams, Dylan Wood, Liam Wood

21 Midfielders

Joe Bell, Dylan Burns, Henry Cameron, Seth Clark, Moses Dyer, Willem Ebbinge, Eli Just, Taci Kumsuz, Clayton Lewis, Lachie McIsaac, Owen Parker-Price, Jake Porter, Dane Schnell, Jack-Henry Sinclair, Sarpreet Singh, Gianni Stensness, Charlie Thomas, Leon van den Hoven, Ollie Whyte, Dom Wooldridge, Trevor Zwetsloot

15 Forwards

Myer Bevan, Noah Billingsley, Matt Conroy, George Debenham, Dauntae Mariner, Max Mata, Callum McCowatt, Jake Mechell, Matt Palmer, Connor Probert, Thomas Raimbault, Logan Rogerson, Kingsley Sinclair, Charles Spragg, Ben Waine

I expect there will be players not on this list who end up being involved in the Pacific Games and OFC Olympic qualifiers – I'd doubt any NCAA players will be involved in late September/early October in the middle of their seasons.

No relation, as far as I'm aware.

Click the image for the full fixture list.

https://www.stuff.co.nz/sport/football/nz-teams/113529413/player-availability-issues-as-under23-mens-football-team-seeks-place-at-tokyo-olympics

https://www.nzfootball.co.nz/newsarticle/79150?fbclid=IwAR1PjC7crRIz51iTGmXqhIWNrq1ccWNErbbKrj-n0qnEEppBQJUHCFZ4zYo

NZ with a 13-0 over Samoa

21 Midfielders

Joe Bell, Dylan Burns, Henry Cameron, Seth Clark, Moses Dyer, Willem Ebbinge, Eli Just, Taci Kumsuz, Clayton Lewis, Lachie McIsaac, Owen Parker-Price, Jake Porter, Dane Schnell, Jack-Henry Sinclair, Sarpreet Singh, Gianni Stensness, Charlie Thomas, Leon van den Hoven, Ollie Whyte, Dom Wooldridge, Trevor Zwetsloot

Is there a more appropriate name for an U23 Oly White player??

Zwetsloot would be great on a triple word score.

Day 1 Results

Group A

Tonga 0 - 13 New Zealand (U23)

Samoa 0 - 6 Papua New Guinea

Group B

Tuvalu 0 - 13 Solomon Islands

Fiji 2 - 1 Tahiti

American Samoa 0 - 5 New Caledonia

Are we playing football or rugby over there?  ;-)

Is Sky TV's Pacific games coverage including the football?

https://www.sky.co.nz/-/pacific-games-to-burst-onto-new-zealand-screens-for-the-first-time-

Anybody know of any live streams of NZ u-23's matches?

The game yesterday (or at least, good chunk of it) was on Sky.

Sky had it on a pop up channel, I think because of that it means the live streams being done by the games organisers are blocked

so would assume as long as NZ playing on the #1 pitch their games will be on Sky (only games from #1 are being shown)

any highlight packages floating around?

Did we play two games in the one day? Probably wouldn't matter.

Live streams of the football would seem to be available here on the official Games football page if you are not in a country receiving live TV coverage or if you use a VPN and select any country not receiving the coverage.

https://www.samoa2019.ws/games/football/

NZ vs. Samoa today 3 pm NZT

NZ vs.Vanuatu Friday 3 pm NZT

NZ vs.PNG Monday 15th 9 am NZT

Finals: Sat. 20th 

Bronze Medal: 9 am

Gold Medal: 12 pm.

Would def watch with VPN if I wasn't working at 3pm

Interested to see what position Buckingham prefers Akers in, given Angell moved him from an attacking player to CB.

Currently 1-0 to us, 28 mins in.

Goalscorer was Rogerson

2-0, another for Rogerson, his 7th of the tournament. Awful defending from Samoa. 

2nd to Rogerson. Also what is also interesting is the referee is a 21 year old female, she is pretty good as well.

He's playing LAM, in case you can't get your eyes on the game.

Should have had his hattrick but missed a sitter right at the end of the half. He's looked good though.

Just finished some very chunky work. No sky at home - any streams??

Probably hardly worth it given the time elapsed of course.....

Who is number 10? Looked lively since coming on.