Kiwis more than also rans in greatest show

DANNY HAY COLUMN

NOW the All Whites have qualified for the World Cup, they need to make sure they are up to the task when they fly into South Africa next year.

Last night's World Cup qualification has secured football bosses in New Zealand a huge injection of money from Fifa.

And I think they need to commit a big chunk of those funds into a proper pre-tournament build-up.

It will be tough when we get there, in terms of winning games. But I think it will be all about credibility.

For us to even get there is like us winning the World Cup. But to give us the best chance, they need to try to get the boys together as much as possible before now and then.

If we can get games against any good opposition then it will be a good thing.

It is not like before when we wanted to play Asian sides because we knew we would have this Asian qualifier – there was no point in going to South America and playing a heap of those sides.

But now in all likelihood we might get one European side, one Asian side and one South American side in our group. So you just want to get games against anybody of decent quality to test our boys.

The more they play together, they better they seem to get.

There were a lot of things said and written in the lead-up to last night's clash against Bahrain in Wellington.

And I really took issue with

comments that the All Whites would be disgraced if they made it all the way.

People who talk like that need a reality check.

This isn't rugby – we are not in all likelihood going to have a chance of winning the thing. But there are 200-plus nations who play football and there are just a few dozen who play rugby. So by being part of the top 32 teams in the world is massive. We need to get our heads out of the sand as a country and understand how big football is worldwide.

Just finally, I really hope our soccer administrators take advantage of what the All Whites have now achieved. We have to learn from the mistakes of 1982. There is a huge amount of momentum behind football at the moment and the administrators need to make sure they grab that and run with it. They didn't do that in 1982 – hopefully they have learned from their mistakes.

It was awesome to be in the grandstand at Westpac Stadium watching the All Whites of `09 emulating the side of 1982.

There were so many heroes – obviously our goal-scorer Rory Fallon deserves all the praise that will come his way following his match-winning header.

And what a night for goalkeeper Mark Paston! He stood up big time – parrying several outstanding strikes and then, of course, saving Bahrain's penalty attempt.

As a former All White, it made me incredibly proud to watch this team writing their own chapter in New Zealand's football history.

- © Fairfax NZ News