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The joy is clear to see as All Whites Ryan Nelson, Mark Paston and Andrew Boyens celebrate their win - Source: Photosport -
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Yes, it is true, a dyed-in-the-wool man raised on rugby got lucky and snaffled a ticket and went to the soccer in Wellington last Saturday night. As a result he is now very proud to be one of the 35,000 Kiwis present who waved and stomped and cheered the exceptional All Whites performance in winning their way to next year's FIFA World Cup finals in South Africa.
To be sure this was one of the greatest New Zealand sports occasions. When an old bloke like me looks back I can readily recall the Kiwi commotion when Dick Tayler came from behind to win the 10,000 metres at the 1974 Commonwealth Games; there was a great atmosphere the night the All Blacks beat the British Lions in the second test in Wellington in 2005 and yes, I was mightily impressed at the deep adulation when the America's Cup came up Queen Street in 2000!
But not many times have Kiwi crowds been as totally committed in blind faith, before, during and after, as they were in the Cake Tin Stadium in Wellington last weekend.
It had started weeks out from kickoff when local city fathers in New Zealand's capital city hinted they could have probably coped with a 70,000 crowd, such was the volume of ticket interest. Alas no stadium of that size exists in New Zealand.
Actually on the night the cheering and chanting from the record football attendance sounded like 70,000! The tumult started for Ryan Nelsen's All Whites team when they emerged for the warm-up shortly after 7pm and hardly a soul left the ground for at least 30 minutes after the fulltime whistle - that is over three hours later.
The din only hushed in the horror moment when Bahrain lined up a penalty shot and there was suddenly the stunned realisation that under the double away goal rule that the Cup campaign was teetering in tatters.
Raised the roof
But Mark Paston's heroic save raised the roof in exaltation. And from then on the excitement was at fever pitch till a massive shout went up when fulltime blew. Rory Fallon's header was the icing on the cake (Tin!) and the win was superbly taken 1-0. Everyone then waited for the winners to walk a full circuit of glorification and acclaim from their faithful. And afterwards, well, the partying and singing went on well into normally quiet Sunday recoveries.
In case you think your columnist had a flash seat in the pressbox or went as some corporate bludger, sipping dry white wine and eating canapes, hold on a minute. My son acquired three last minute $40 temporary seats which meant he and his wife took the (pleading) old man along. And the tickets turned out, we reckoned, to be the best in the ground.
We were front row at halfway in one of the great bargains of all time. We felt we were right in the crunch of the action. So much so I thought I could detect the Bahrain players sag in the cold of the feisty, swirling Wellington wind and noticeably lose control of many of their kicks. The man who took the penalty shot froze on his shot I reckon. Notwithstanding Paston's great save it was such a feeble attempt.
To be sure the home weather conditions favoured the New Zealand team. Never again do I want to hear complaints about windy Wellington's weather! The team did its bit, sure, and so did the crowd but the weather was delightfully supportive too.
Epic night
Walking back to the city afterwards continued the delight of being part of the epic night (although dancing in the middle of the crowded traffic was perhaps overdoing it a little!) My wife and I have recently switched to live in the Wellington city area so all night we heard raucous men singing, women wailing, sirens wailing, car horns tooting in unison and general pandemonium wafting into the night air.
Even on Sunday morning when I woke to watch a replay of the All Blacks rugby test in Milan there was still party noise coming up from down below. Methinks there would have been many, many headaches around town.
To change the subject but adding to my story here, because an initial comparison might become increasingly relevant, I then sat and watched the All Blacks v Italy rugby game on video. Truthfully, there was a massive gap in quality of performance and excitement between the rugby and the soccer internationals.
The irony of the All Whites being triumphant in a home stadium which had been largely built for rugby's needs while our rugby All Blacks struggled to gain ascendancy in a massive soccer arena in a football crazy nation was screamingly poignant.
I was left asking myself, admittedly with the advantage of hindsight, what would I have preferred to go to see; twelve messy scrums in the same place on the field as the climax to a rugby test? Or personally feel part of a knife-edge to and fro struggle with everything at stake in a do or die football match of high excitement?
Infectious
Ask yourselves.
Let me leave it to the two teams' coaches; Ricki Herbert of the All Whites might have dropped a few naughty words in his immediate aftermatch TV interview but his joy was infectious. On the other hand Graham Henry of the All Blacks looked tight-lipped and drawn as he called the last ten scrum-filled moments in Milan - a 'farce' of an ending to a rugby game.
So soccer (we still call it that in ordinary New Zealand-speak) celebrated a deserved and famous chapter for their sport in Wellington. The game's place in New Zealand has been confirmed as being on the rise for some time. The FIFA Under-17 women's tournament last year in New Zealand was wonderful and a revelation to watch, and this year's boy's effort in the same age-group in Nigeria when they made their World Cup quarter-finals was a joy too.
Yes, rugby had its Under-20 World Cup win in Japan this year and that too was great for the future, but face it, us rugger types, it is soccer which did itself proud last weekend pushing the traditional 'national' game off the front pages and becoming its own nationwide and world headline.
The quality of the All Blacks game, so disappointingly seen yet again to be at the mercy of its convoluted lawbook did not look good by comparison. Maybe as far as rugby is concerned the only bright spot in that same 24 hour period of the weekend was a 'Bring Back Buck' sign seen hanging at the Wellington Stadium.
But the sign which reminds New Zealanders of a controversial rugby incident of nearly 20 years ago only flapped wanly in the wind. Was it a symbol of glory days so long since past for the sport?
Now as a result of what we all saw the All Whites achieve there is now undeniably a new tingle in the air for New Zealand sport to follow.
