The 18th-ranked Football Ferns are now in Spain as they build towards Tuesday morning’s clash with their hosts and the New Zealand coach says the group can now begin to see June’s FIFA Women’s World Cup on the horizon.
“We’re getting to the business end of our preparation now and we’ve been on this campaign really since the end of the Olympics when we got the High Performance Sport New Zealand funding,” Readings said.
“Now it’s about putting the final pieces of the jigsaw together and we’ve had quite a few games this year to be able to work on things and the closer we get to the tournament the more we want to really refine what we do.”
Hot on the heels of the tri-series in Auckland earlier this month, Readings has set match focus points to work on with his group after their experience against Korea DPR and the Westfield Matildas at Bill McKinlay Park.
“On this tour particularly we want to build on what we did in the February tri-series and become that little bit more effective in creating goal scoring opportunities and we want to go back to where we were in being harder to break down defensively. For us it’s going to be refining those two aspects of our game.
“Also just becoming a little bit smarter in how we play the game. We’ve got a certain style of football that we play which we’re renowned for now yet sometimes you have to alter that style depending on what the opposition do.”
Readings says that in Spain they have secured an opponent which reflect some of the characteristics of the Ferns own rise up the rankings while they will be tested by some traits which mirror the powerhouse Spanish men’s side.
“It’s going to be a very tough test. They are a team much like us that have really grown and improved in the last few years.
“They are team that have beaten England recently, they are team that don’t concede many goals and they are also team that’s got very good individuals that can break you down. They are similar to the men’s team in some ways but different in others and we know it’s going to be very tough to score goals against them.
“It’s a great test for the World Cup because every team we will come up against in our group and beyond has those key individuals. The best teams in the world have those game-breakers and Spain have a few forwards who can do that to you out of nothing and it’s going to be a really good test of how we handle them.”
Once next week’s two games have been and gone Readings has a clear understanding of where he wants his side to be before they continue the last part of their build-up against the United States and Japan later in the year.
“We’d like to have a much better idea about who are going to be the key players for us at the World Cup. We don’t want to be experimenting too close to the World Cup because we’ve got to make sure we’re allowing those combinations to flourish and blossom as we go forward.
“As a team [we want] to become a lot more robust in every moment of the game so when we haven’t got the ball we’re very hard to break down and when we have got it we’re not predictable at all and we can hurt opposition in a lot of different ways.”
Football Ferns squad – Spain tour
Caps/Goals/Club
Goalkeepers
Cushla Lichtwark (0/0 – Upper Hutt City, NZL)
Erin Nayler (24/0 – Glenfield Rovers, NZL)
Defenders
CJ Bott (1/0 – Forrest Hill Milford Utd AFC, NZL)
Abby Erceg (capt – 109/5 – Chicago Red Stars, USA)
Meikayla Moore (10/0 – Eastern Suburbs AFC, NZL)
Ria Percival (101/11 – USV Jena, GER)
Ali Riley (89/1 – FC Rosengard, SWE)
Rebekah Stott (35/2 – unattached)
Midfielders
Katie Bowen (22/0 – University of North Carolina, USA)
Daisy Cleverley (3/2 – Forrest Hill Milford Utd AFC, NZL)
Betsy Hassett (75/8 – unattached)
Katie Hoyle (98/1 – FC Zurich, SWI)
Annalie Longo (76/6 – Coastal Spirit, NZL)
Evie Millynn (2/0 – Western Springs AFC, NZL)
Kirsty Yallop (86/12 – Vittsjo GIK, SWE)
Forwards
Sarah Gregorius (62/23 – AS Elfen Saitama, JPN)
Amber Hearn (95/44 – USV Jena, GER)
Jasmine Pereira (4/0 – Three Kings Utd, NZL)
Rosie White (65/14 – unattached)
Hannah Wilkinson (65/21 – University of Tennessee, USA)
Management staff
Head coach: Tony Readings
Assistant coach: Aaron McFarland
Assistant coach: Danny Robinson
Manager: Claire Hamilton
Performance Analyst: Gary Connell
Sports Scientist: Harriet Steele
Physiotherapist: Catherine Porteous
Doctor: Julie Shamlaye
Match schedule
Spain v Football Ferns
Tuesday 3 March, 7pm (Wednesday 4 March, 7am NZ time)
Pedro Escartin Stadium, Guadalajara, Spain
Spain v Football Ferns
Thursday 5 March, 8pm (Friday 6 March, 8am NZ time)
La Roda Municipal Stadium, La Roda, Spain
Courtesy NZF Media. For more on New Zealand football football visit nzfootball.co.nz.

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