Fijian Soccer Team To Play 7 Games

Press, Volume CVIII, Issue 31753, 9 August 1968, Page 12

Fijian Soccer Team To Play 7 Games

(New Zealand Press Association) AUCKLAND. Seven games will be played by the Fijian soccer team during its short tour of New Zealand next month.

Mr C. J. Dempsey, the director of tours for the New Zealand Football Association, said on his return from the islands last evening that the Fijians would first play in New Caledonia before meeting the Auckland under-23 team on September 5. The only other two definite matches were against Wellington on September 14 and against the New Zealand World Cup side, probably on September 17 in Auckland.

It would be the difficut task of the N.Z.F.A. to award the other four games among the numerous minor associations anxious for a game with the visitors, Mr Dempsey said. He was impressed with the speed of the Fijians, although one problem for them on the New Zealand tour might be the playing of two 45-minute halves instead of their normal two 30-minute sessions.

It was expected that the side would be mainly players of Indian extraction, although it would probably include three or four Fijians. One of Mr Dempsey’s objects on his short trip to the islands was to further the

idea of a three-year programme of tours among the soccer teams of New Zealand, Australia, Fiji and New Caledonia under the control of the Oceania Federation. This would replace the present situation in which tours were made and received by the four countries in a rather haphazard fashion.