Women fall to NZ

By HENRY MORABANG
THE PNG women’s soccer team were given an 8-0 thrashing by New Zealand in the first leg of the Oceania Olympic qualifiers in Whangarei, New Zealand, on Saturday.
The loss dashed any hopes, however faint, of PNG creating history by qualifying for the Olympic Games in London in July.
On the other side of the coin, the victory puts New Zealand one step towards Olympic qualification and all but assured a berth in London.
PNG coach Steven Mune must now go back to the drawing board in preparation for the return leg on Wednesday at Lloyd Robson Oval in Port Moresby.
The first leg of the OFC women’s Olympic qualifier on Saturday was just a Olympic Games formality for the Football Ferns completely outclassed the 2011 Pacific Games gold medallists.
Mune admitted after the game that it was going to be tough against the New Zealand who have several professional players from the German women’s premier soccer competition.
“We know New Zealand are a very good side and we saw that today (Saturday).
“Their first two goals came from corner kicks but otherwise I thought in the first half we played well as a unit and defended well.”
The former PNG men’s striker is banking on PNG’s humid weather to help slow down the rampant Kiwis if his team were to have a chance at avenging the loss.
“At home the heat is going to be on our side and we will try to pay it back to them and score some goals. The return leg is set for 2pm which could be very hot for the visitors,” Mune said.
New Zealand scored four goals in each half and were never threatened by the visitors who set out to keep the Football Ferns at bay and take the tie back to Port Moresby on Wednesday still in the hunt.
But from the sixth minute when the Whangarei-raised pair of Abby Erceg and Hannah Wilkinson combined to open the scoring in front of a 2,243 strong crowd at Toll Stadium, the home side never let up.
In a sign of how much distance the Ferns have put between themselves and their Oceania rivals in recent years, the score was not reflective of New Zealand’s dominance with a litany of let-offs and a mass of defenders in the PNG half keeping the score in single figures.
“It’s pretty hard to fault them, they played for 90 minutes and were just relentless.” 
New Zealand coach Tony Readings also acknowledged PNG’s effort saying his side were made to work for the goals.
“They’re definitely far more athletic than we’ve seen them in the past.
“I would love to see them play a little bit more football because when they did today they actually hurt us quite a few times,” he said.
New Zealand arrive tomorrow for the return leg.