Testing times for defender

JOHN SELKIRK/The Dominion Post

HEADS UP: The under-17 World Cup is the top priority for Yumi Nguyen.

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Yumi Nguyen's first of four end-of-year exams is the day after the under-17 women's football World Cup final.

Conundrum? Absolutely not.

After all, exams can be taken again, but the opportunity to play in a Fifa World Cup is a rare thing for any New Zealand footballer.

"I think most of us will be studying during the next few weeks – we have time set aside for study – but the World Cup is the priority for all of us," the Wellington 17-year-old said this week.

"It's really exciting because we've been waiting two years for this."

Defender Nguyen, a former Onslow and Miramar Rangers player, is one of two Wellingtonians in the New Zealand team for the October 28-November 16 tournament, the other being Hannah Wall.

Both have uprooted themselves during their seventh form year and moved to Auckland so the team could prepare together, Nguyen leaving her friends at Wellington Girls College and joining Wall at Auckland's Epsom Girls Grammar.

Nguyen is staying with family friends in her first year away from the city of her birth.

"I've had to move cities and give up my old school, and it was my last year of school so I had to give up leadership roles and captain of my school team, and just the whole social life, but it's all worth it.

"And it's good to have my teammates up here, they're all supportive. Basically, when we're not on the field, we're together because they're pretty much my best friends. We're a really tight team."

But that tightness is not always on show at training, with the players competing fiercely for spots ahead of their opening match of the tournament against Canada in Auckland on October 28.

"Everyone is peaking performance and fitness-wise so it has been quite hard these past couple of weeks. It's really competitive, just the training, the fitness and everything."

Nguyen said New Zealand aimed to get out of group stage and into the quarterfinals, which would see them play at Wellington's Westpac Stadium for a second time.

Their first two group matches, against Canada and Denmark, are in Auckland, with the third, against Colombia, in Wellington on November 4.

Meanwhile, a Fifa ambassadors tour, featuring Oceania player of the century Wynton Rufer, former New Zealand international and Fifa ambassador Michele Cox and former Italian striker and coach Carolina Morace, rolled into Wellington yesterday.

The trio will spend the next two days promoting the World Cup and women's football, conducting a series of coaching clinics in Wellington and Lower Hutt today and various other promotional activities before heading to Napier on Saturday.

- © Fairfax NZ News