The All Whites are winners when it comes to their top-ranked team video, and Tim Payne’s instant rise to instagram fame is unbeatable.
Now all the pressure is on the team to break their own record and crack through the first round of the Fifa World Cup 2026.
“This is the best New Zealand team we’ve ever had,” says former All White Noel Barkley. “There is quality in all 11 starters and in most of the backup players, they’re all professional players. It’s a massive change.”
It will be a first for the team if they get to the second round, after they were eliminated from their first rounds in their two previous World Cup campaigns in 1982 and 2010.
They’ve had a setback this week when they lost 4-0 against Haiti, a scoreline they “can’t hide behind” says coach Darren Bazeley. But they’ll have to recover quickly as they face high-ranked England in another friendly this weekend.
“There’s that expectation that you’ve had this great buildup,” says RNZ sports report Felicity Reid. “You’ve got players who’ve got the skills and the opportunities. Now get out of the group at a world cup.”
Since the draw was announced in December, the Kiwis’ first match against Iran in Los Angeles on June 16 has been in the headlines, not for the football but the geopolitics.
Despite political pressure to move the match, Fifa bosses are sticking to their decision to keep it in LA, Reid says. But security will be tight given the Californian city is home to the largest population of Iranians outside Iran.
“Fifa have been pretty steadfast that they didn’t want to change that,” Reid tells The Detail. “You can imagine there’s logistics from 48 teams and there’s TV deals and stadium deals and things that nobody wants to mess with. So they’ve always said this is where this game’s going to be.”
Fifa have compromised to an extent by allowing Iran to move their training base from Arizona to Tijuana, Mexico. But they’re not there yet.
Whether the Iranians can get into the US is another matter, says Reid.
“Just this week they were still trying to get visas that would give them access to the US and Mexico. They’ve said that they’re just going to leave and try and come in and hope that they get the visas to let them play in this tournament which they’ve qualified for.”
Other off-field controversies include the fans’ threats to boycott the tournament in protest over US politics and the sky high price of tickets, as well as the cost of public transport to games.
Reid says it is not clear how many tickets have been sold but prices change due to “dynamic pricing”.
“If we look at the SoFi stadium where the All Whites are playing the first game, that’s a 75,000 seat stadium, New Zealand fans get an eight percent allocation.
“You don’t imagine it’s going to sell out.”
The All Whites go into this campaign more famous than ever thanks to an Argentinian influencer who decided virtual unknown Tim Payne needed more love.
His Instagram followers have surged from a few hundred to around five million, inspiring songs and posts from around the world.
The social media phenomenon has stunned diehard football fans but Reid says it highlights the closeknit global community of the sport.
“Tim Payne’s not really the kind of guy who you’d imagine if anyone was going to go viral in the team it probably wasn’t Tim,” she says.
All Noel Barkley cares about is the Kiwis’ performance on the field.
He’s attended several World Cups but he says this one stands out for the record-breaking 104 games being played by 48 teams at 16 venues across three nations, Mexico, US and Canada.
“They’re the raw reasons why its different. Ambitious, never been done before,” says Barkley, who admits to being apprehensive about the event.
“Probably no one expected what was going on globally in terms of wars and ceasefires, so hard to know how that’s going to affect things but I still think that when it goes, it’ll just go and the other stuff might be in the background as long it’s quiet.
“As New Zealand fans we’re just focused on us and trying to get three points, maybe four to get out of the group and do that for the first time.”
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