Chris Wood leads All Whites to win over Fiji

Chris Wood made history as the All Whites beat Fiji 4-0 in their second group game at the Oceania World Cup qualifying tournament in Qatar.

Wood and Reid
Photo: PHOTOSPORT

It is their second win, following a 1-0 victory over Papua New Guinea, and qualifies them for the semi-finals of the tournament.

The New Zealand dominated possession and territory in the first half but were guilty of some poor finishing and only managed to take the lead on the stroke of half time when Chris Wood headed home a cross.

Substitute Elija Just netted after 71 minutes before Wood got his second two minutes later.

Wood’s brace made him the All Whites all-time leading goal scorer with 30. He went ahead of Vaughn Coveny, who had 29.

“It means a lot, it’s something that sought after for a very long time so to break it is a dream come true and hopefully I can add a few more goals to it over the course of my career.”

“It’s only been in the last few (international) windows that it started to get closer, so it’s nice to have that ticked that off and I can look back on when I finish my career, but there’s still a lot more to achieve in my career.”

Wood concedes they should have done better in today’s win over Fiji.

“A hundred percent, definitely need to be a bit more clinical, we need to take those chances because they’re not going to come as freely when you get to the semi-finals or finals.”

Clayton Lewis completed the scoring with a penalty in the final minute.

New Zealand next play New Caledonia on Friday.

Papua New Guinea beat New Caledonia 1-0 in today’s other game.

Just one game has been possible in the other group because of Covid in two of the teams.

The winner of the Oceania tournament will meet the fourth placed team from CONCACAF in the inter-continental play-off in June.

CONCACAF is the confederation of North and Central America and Caribbean Associations.

The winner of that one-pff game qualifies for the FIFA World Cup finals in Qatar in November and December.