Will Chris Wood be unleashed at the Football World Cup?
Analysis - Will Chris Wood be unleashed at the Football World Cup?
Since the All Whites qualified for the World Cup they have played 1080 minutes of football in the lead-up to their return to the sport’s biggest stage in a week’s time.
Across the 12 matches played over 18 months, two of the 26-man All Whites squad, back-up goalkeeper Michael Woud and defender Tommy Smith, have played zero minutes.
At the opposite end of the scale centre-back Finn Surman has played 974 minutes for the All Whites, by far the most of any player.
But what about captain and target man Wood?
Wood would have been the first name on coach Darren Bazeley’s World Cup squad list.
The 34-year-old is at his second World Cup after playing in the three games at the 2010 tournament in South Africa, just a year after making his All Whites debut.
Wood is now the most capped All White, breaking the record in New Zealand’s first warm-up game against Haiti, but he has not played 90 minutes of football for the national side since October 2023 against DR Congo.
Injuries and deals done with his club side Nottingham Forest meant Wood’s involvement on the international stage had been limited for years.
Influence can not be measured in minutes - but strikers can only score goals when they are on the field.
Wood is not only seen as the All Whites’ best goal-scoring option but is a leader the playing group respect. Even if Wood’s recovery from knee surgery had hampered his form Bazeley still would have included him in the squad.
Bazeley knows New Zealand is lucky to have a talent like Wood to call on but he has not been able to deploy him as often or for as long as he would always like.
After the game against Haiti last week Bazeley said “we don’t take Chris Wood off, our captain, on 60 minutes normally, when we don’t have to”.
However, taking Wood off at the hour mark does happen regularly.
During the World Cup qualifiers against Samoa and Fiji he was subbed at the 64th and 62nd minute respectively and in the World Cup qualifiers final against New Caledonia at 54 minutes.
He came off the bench for eight minutes against Ivory Coast in June last year, a match considered to be one the All Whites’ biggest scalps in recent times.
In the same tournament against Ukraine he played nine minutes.
In September last year in the Soccer Ashes against Australia, Wood was taken off just after 60 minutes in both losses.
After the second game Bazeley said it was “always the plan to get him off when we did”.
“It’s not ideal but it is what it is.
“He puts so much into playing for New Zealand and he turns up and he does everything off the pitch.
“He’s such a good person, he gives his time so much so he deserves us to work with him.
“But it’s difficult because do I look like the coach that takes off a Premier League goal-scorer after 65 minutes, maybe that’s what it looks like, we see it as giving opportunity to players.”
On Sunday, Wood did play 78 minutes against England in the All Whites’ last hit out before their opening game of the World Cup against Iran on 16 June, marking the most he has played since the first game of the World Cup qualifiers in November 2024.
While Wood has not played the least minutes of his World Cup teammates, outside of Woud and Smith that goes to defender Nando Pijanker with 31 minutes since qualifying, he is a different level of player.
Wood is an automatic starter while Pijnaker and a few others with low minutes are stuck behind other players.
The World Cup games will be the biggest matches the All Whites have played in more than a decade and come with the expectation that the team will make it out of the group for the first time.
To meet their expectations they will need to score goals against world number 20 Iran, Egypt (29) and Belgium (9). Wood will not be able to do it alone but if he was able to lead the line for close to 90 minutes New Zealand will have their best chance of creating history at the World Cup.
How many minutes the All Whites have played since World Cup qualification
- Finn Surman - 974
- Marko Stamenić - 828
- Sarpreet Singh - 778
- Max Crocombe - 759
- Eli Just - 736
- Tyler Bindon - 698
- Francis De Vries - 595
- Michael Boxall - 588
- Joe Bell - 577
- Ben Old - 569
- Tim Payne - 536
- Matt Garbett - 429
- Ryan Thomas - 371
- Ben Waine - 363
- Kosta Barbarouses - 362
- Chris Wood - 357
- Alex Paulsen - 321
- Alex Rufer - 292
- Liberato Cacace -286
- Jesse Randall -263
- Callan Elliot - 187
- Callum McCowatt - 163
- Lachlan Bayliss - 75
- Nando Pijnaker - 31
- Michael Woud - 0
- Tommy Smith - 0
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