In the early hours of this morning, the last match of the World Preliminary Round Oceania Division was played in Doha, Qatar, and the result was no suspense, New Zealand won the Solomon Islands 5-0 and won the Oceania Division Championship for 4 consecutive years! Since Australia joined the AFC, New Zealand has become the only king of the region.
Solomon Islands have reached the final of the Oceania Division in two consecutive World Preliminaries, and the last time they tried their best home and away, it was still a 3-8 disparity. The Solomon Islands remained unsettled in neutrality, having been scored twice by New Zealand defender Tuiloma and number one Chris Wood in the first half alone. New Zealand scored three more goals in the second half and won the Oceania division with a five-goal win. Renowned Striker Chris Wood from the Premier League has scored five goals in four games and has been the Golden Boot of the Oceania Division for two consecutive years.
In Oceania, the strength of the New Zealand team is indeed outstanding, even if their international ranking in the past 8 years is outside the top 100, but the "civil war" is still easy to deal with the little brothers. Winning all five World Cup games, New Zealand scored 17 goals and conceded only 1. In this morning's final, they launched a bombing blast around the Solomon Islands goal, with 21 shots on goal and 15 shots on target, if it were not for the Solomon Islands goalkeeper's excellent performance, the score would be more exaggerated.
But after a brief period of madness, New Zealand will face tougher challenges. Oceania has always had only 0.5 tickets, and the regional champions have been erratic in the play-offs of previous World Cups. Since the World Cup in South Africa, New Zealand have played in play-offs against Asian, Central and North American and South American teams, except for Bahrain, who won Asia in 2010, the remaining two have lost to Mexico and Peru, missing the final round.
On the morning of the 31st Beijing time, after the final round of the Central and American Qualifiers, New Zealand's opponents in the play-offs will be revealed, and their opponents will be one of the three teams of Mexico, the United States or Costa Rica. However, according to the situation in the last round of the game, Mexico's home game against the weaker Salvador should be directly qualified, and the United States team, which is 3 points ahead, should be able to successfully challenge Costa Rica in the last round of away games with 10 goal difference advantages (Costa Rica needs to win at least 5 goals per goal). As a result, New Zealand will most likely play against Costa Rica, the 4th place in Central America, in the play-offs.
The final play-offs will also be played in Qatar, also the neutral venue of the World Cup, in mid-June, and the match will still be a winner-win game. Although it was easy to win the Oceania Division after only 5 games, New Zealand's World Cup dream still has the toughest final match. So do you think this New Zealand team has the ability to challenge World Cup regular Costa Rica?