Chris Wood feels he “should be alright” to play for the All Whites against Curaçao this weekend, despite picking up a knock in his last English Premier League outing with Burnley.
But the news wasn’t so great for uncapped fullback Dalton Wilkins, who didn’t make the trip to Bahrain for the national men’s football teams first matches in almost 700 days, after picking up an injury in training on the eve of the October international window.
Wood is set to lead the All Whites with Winston Reid not available to play in the friendlies against the Caribbean nation of Curaçao and the Middle Eastern nation of Bahrain, who New Zealand defeated in 2009 to qualify for the 2010 World Cup.
Hay said the timing of Wilkins’ injury and “how difficult travel is at this stage,” amidst the Covid-19 pandemic, meant there was no chance to call up a replacement, leaving him with 20 players to choose from.
Liberato Cacace was set to start on the left flank, whether as a fullback or a wingback, and uncapped right backs Niko Kirwan and Kelvin Kalua will now be tasked with providing cover there.
Kirwan played on the left quite often in Serie B with Reggiana last year, while Kalua has experience there too, albeit only in New Zealand’s amateur northern and national leagues. Hay also hinted that depending on the game situation, he could also deploy a more attacking option on that flank.
While this month’s matches are the All Whites first since November 2019, when they lost to the Republic of Ireland and Lithuania during Hay’s first window in charge, they come hot on the heels of the OlyWhites under-24 team’s appearance at the Tokyo Olympics in July.
That campaign resulted in New Zealand’s first win in Olympic men’s football, over South Korea, as well as its first appearance in the knockout stages, but ultimately ended with a penalty shootout loss to hosts Japan in the quarterfinals.
Wood is one of 11 players in Bahrain this week who were also present at the Olympics, a group that includes promising youngsters Cacace, Joe Bell, Elijah Just, and Callum McCowatt.
They have been joined by a number of senior players who missed out on the three over-age places available in Hay’s squad for what was predominantly an under-24 tournament, including goalkeepers Stefan Marinovic and Nik Tzanev and centre backs Michael Boxall, Tommy Smith, and Bill Tuiloma, as well as youngster Sarpreet Singh, who opted to focus on establishing himself at his new loan club, Jahn Regensburg, whose season began in the middle of the tournament.
Wood said the Olympic campaign had “showed the promise of what could come in the future”.
“That’s the great thing about it, and now it’s about progressing it into the national team. The standard’s going to be higher, and we need to be up for that.
“I’m sure the boys are more than capable of stepping up to the plate. I’ve seen enough in the Olympic campaign to know that the transition into the national team isn’t going to be that much of a step up, so I’m excited to see what they can do now.”
Bahrain and Curaçao played in Manama on Wednesday [Thursday morning NZ time] with the hosts winning 4-0 after scoring three times in the final 10 minutes.
Hay and a few of his staff were at that match, which featured water breaks in each half in hot conditions, and said they would have to see how their players pulled up after Saturday’s match [kickoff Sunday 5am NZ time] before deciding how they approached the one against Bahrain next Tuesday [kickoff Wednesday 5am NZ time].
Curaçao and Bahrain were the two strongest opponents the All Whites could have played in this window, with many nations in the middle of qualifying for the World Cup next year. They both narrowly missed out on advancing to the next stage of Concacaf and Asian qualifying respectively earlier this year and are ranked 79th and 91st in the world by Fifa, well ahead of New Zealand at 121.
These matches effectively mark the start of the All Whites’ campaign to qualify for next year’s World Cup in Qatar. They are set to play more friendlies in November ahead of an Oceania qualifying tournament in Qatar in March, but the details of that event are still to be announced.