Editorial: All White on the night

OPINION: Let's face it, soccer is a long way from being New Zealand's national sport.

And in many instances the Kiwis who do follow it passionately tend to have some close connection to England or Scotland, or one of the other European nations where it is the most popular sporting code by many a mile.

But that shouldn't stop every New Zealander today from focusing on the "beautiful game", because a piece of New Zealand sporting history stands to be made before a capacity 35,000 crowd in Wellington.

Quite simply, this is the biggest day in New Zealand soccer since Steve Sumner's All Whites side reached the World Cup finals in 1982. The current side, coached by Ricki Herbert, who was part of that storied line-up 27 years ago, can become only the second New Zealand team ever to make it to one of global sport's greatest showpieces.

There is no bigger single-sport event than soccer's World Cup every four years and it would be a huge achievement for New Zealand to make it there, especially as it's being held in the Southern Hemisphere next year, with South Africa as hosts.

True, if the All Whites do manage to beat Bahrain in the capital, having drawn 0-0 in Manama in the first leg a month ago, critics will be able to point to the fact that their route to the finals appears to have been a reasonably easy one. There will be countries that miss out on qualifying for the event which can justifiably express dissatisfaction with the fact that a side which lost to Fiji during its qualifying campaign is going to South Africa.

Indeed, winning a group also containing Fiji, Vanuatu and New Caledonia, before having to overcome the legitimate threat of Bahrain, does seem relatively easy compared to what teams in the soccer hotbeds of Europe and South America will have had to go through.

To get to Spain in 1982, the All Whites went through a rigorous 15-match qualifying campaign, facing Australia, China, Kuwait and Saudi Arabia among others, at a time when only 24 countries, instead of the current 32, made it to the finals.

But the All Whites should not worry about that. It's obviously not their fault that qualifying has, on the face of it, been made easier. They simply have to make the best of the hand they've been dealt and ensure that the capacity crowd go home happy and feeling a swell of pride that will surely be reflected throughout the country.

It all comes down to 90 crucial minutes in Wellington's "Cake Tin", or perhaps 120 and even a penalty shootout. Hopefully, the All Whites will ensure it doesn't get that far by winning the tie in regulation time. Either way, this game will go down in New Zealand soccer history. Let's hope it's for the right reasons.