Swiss Soccer Club Will Be Severe Test For N.Z.

Press, Volume CIII, Issue 30348, 25 January 1964, Page 9

Swiss Soccer Club Will Be Severe Test For N.Z.

rpHE New Zealand soccer team will receive a valuable preview of the kind of opposition it can expect to meet on its world tour in March when the Swiss team, F. C. Basle, plays the national XI at Blandford Park, Auckland, on Monday evening.

Because of European Cup and local commitments the team originally due to visit New Zealand, Zurich, the Swiss champion side, had to withdraw, but the substitution of Basle has certainly not made New Zealand’s task any easier. In fact, in the current Swiss competition Basle has scored ahead of Zurich, beating last season’s top club, 2-0, last month, and holding a commanding points lead in the Swiss competition. Basle will arive in Auck-

land on Monday from Australia, where it will have played matches in Melbourne and Sydney, and all 18 players to go. on New Zealand’s world tour will be there to meet the Swiss club. A selected New Zealand team will meet Blockhouse Bay, the strong Auckland club, in the morning, and the match against Basle will be played under lights in the evening. The Swiss club is one of the most powerful in Europe, with seven international players. Three of these —K. Stettler (goalkeeper), H. Weber (righthalf) and T. Frigerio (centre-forward) played for Switzerland in the World Cup competition in Chile in 1962.

Another full international is K. Odermatt, the club’s talented inside right, who has played three times for the national team. Three players have also won “B” international honours —B. Michaud, the centre-half and captain, and M. Pfirter and H. Blumer, both forwards. The most celebrated member of the team is Weber, who has won 23 international caps in various positions. A player who would not disgrace a world XI. Weber is a commanding personality in the righthalf position, dictating his side’s tactics in defence and

attack. The only players with comparable experience in the New Zealand team are the national coach, K. Armstrong, the former English international and Chelsea captain, and R. B. Ormond, the former Scottish League professional and New Zealand captain. The New Zealand XI is still a very raw and untried combination, and it would be foolish to expect too much from it at this stage of its preparation for the world tour, Basle is in the middle of its home season, match fit and vastly more experienced; for most of the New Zealander players it will be their first game since the tour trials were held last September. Last season Basle was beaten only 2-1 by the fam-

ous Barcelona club, which is one of the three foremost clubs in Europe (the others are Real Madrid and Inter Milan) and also carried off the Swiss Cup. But whatever the result the experience the New Zealanders' gain will be as important as a victory, for the tour that begins in March—the first undertaken by the national soccer side —is of tremendous importance to the development of the code here. Any problems that can be solved before the players leave New Zealand’s shores will make their task that little more easier.