\u201cThis window has come too soon,\u201d All Whites coach Darren Bazeley told the Herald. \u201cI don\u2019t think he\u2019s going to play for Forest for the next few weeks until it\u2019s completely recovered. Obviously, it\u2019s not ideal when you lose your captain and a Premier League goalscorer. We\u2019re a team that hasn\u2019t scored lots of goals, so it does make things a little bit harder. But we have to deal with it and it means opportunities for other players.\u201d<\/p>\n
Chris Wood scored against Australia in September. Photo \/ Photosport<\/p>\n
Bazeley said they were unlikely to change their shape, though would make \u201ctweaks\u201d to allow for the absence of Wood.<\/p>\n
It means that veteran Kosta Barbarouses, Ben Waine and Andre de Jong are the striker options. All three have their different attributes. Barbarouses has the most experience \u2013 with 70 games \u2013 though has yet to prove himself consistently on the international stage, especially against the bigger nations and eight of his nine goals for the All Whites have come against Oceania teams. But Bazeley said he is still seen as the understudy to Wood, given his record of excellence in the A-League<\/a>.<\/p>\n This squad is boosted by the return of vice-captain Liberato Cacace, who has missed the last two windows with a hamstring injury picked up at Wrexham AFC. Attacking midfielder Elijah Just, who is enjoying an excellent season at Scottish Premiership team Motherwell, is also back in the mix after injury.<\/p>\n Swansea midfielder Marko Stamenic has been selected for the games at this stage, though Bazeley said details will be ironed out at a later stage, with Stamenic still grieving the tragic recent passing of his father Nikola Stamenic.<\/p>\n \u201cIt\u2019s such horrendous news, hearing that he\u2019s lost his dad,\u201d Bazeley said. \u201cHe pretty much came on every tour to support Marko and the team so he\u2019s really close to a lot of the players. It\u2019s just terrible, terrible news. Marko\u2019s with his family at the moment. We\u2019ll talk to Marko [at some stage] around what he wants from the tour and how he is. At this stage, we\u2019re still planning on Marko being there and I think he\u2019ll want to be around the players for that period.\u201d<\/p>\n Central Coast Mariners right fullback Storm Roux has replaced Tim Payne, who broke his collarbone playing for the Wellington Phoenix last week, while Bill Tuiloma is another option there. Bazeley conceded that Callan Elliott was unfortunate to miss the cut, as at the time of selection the Auckland FC man wasn\u2019t playing but now could have an extended run of game time with captain Hiroki Sakai\u2019s absence. <\/p>\n \u201cMaybe the timing has gone against Callan,\u201d Bazeley said.<\/p>\n Auckland FC teammate Jesse Randall was also \u201cvery, very close\u201d to making the trip, after an impressive start to the season<\/a>.<\/p>\n \u201cHe is flexible positionally and looking really sharp,\u201d Bazeley said. \u201cThere is a lot of competition for places but he is on the radar and potentially a bit unlucky.\u201d <\/p>\n Logan Rogerson\u2019s lack of club game time counted against him, while Nando Pijnaker wasn\u2019t considered, as he works his way back from a long-term ankle injury.<\/p>\n Uncapped Sweden-based Kees Sims has been picked as the third goalkeeper option, replacing Nik Tzanev, who has struggled for recent match minutes. Otherwise, the core of the squad remains the same, though Bazeley confirmed there is still a lot to play for ahead of the Fifa World Cup next June. <\/p>\n \u201cThis is a window with two big games and we\u2019ll always try and select as strong a squad as we can,\u201d Bazeley said. \u201cBut the World Cup is still a long way away, and there\u2019s a lot of football to be played, especially with club football. This window doesn\u2019t rule anybody out.\u201d<\/p>\n All Whites November internationals<\/p>\n Colombia v New Zealand \u2013 Sunday November 16<\/p>\n Fort Lauderdale, Florida, 1pm (NZT)<\/p>\n Ecuador v New Zealand \u2013 Wednesday November 19<\/p>\n Harrison, New Jersey, 1.30pm (NZT)<\/p>\n All Whites squad<\/p>\n Goalkeepers: <\/p>\n Alex Paulsen (5 caps\/0 goals) Lechia Gda\u0144sk, Poland <\/p>\n Max Crocombe (19\/0) Millwall<\/p>\n Kees Sims (debut) GAIS, Sweden<\/p>\n Defenders<\/p>\n Tyler Bindon (20\/3) Sheffield United<\/p>\n Michael Boxall (60\/1) Minnesota United<\/p>\n Liberato Cacace (35\/1) Wrexham AFC, Wales<\/p>\n Francis de Vries (15\/1) Auckland FC<\/p>\n Storm Roux (16\/0) Central Coast Mariners <\/p>\n George Stanger (0\/0) Kilmarnock <\/p>\n Finn Surman (13\/2) Portland Timbers <\/p>\n Bill Tuiloma (45\/4) Charlotte FC <\/p>\n Midfielders<\/p>\n Joe Bell (28\/1) Viking FK, Norway<\/p>\n Matt Garbett (34\/5) Peterborough United <\/p>\n Eli Just (38\/8) Motherwell <\/p>\n Callum McCowatt (28\/4) Silkeborg IF, Denmark<\/p>\n Ben Old (18\/1) AS Saint-\u00c9tienne<\/p>\n Alex Rufer (22\/0) Wellington Phoenix <\/p>\n Sarpreet Singh (24\/3) FK TSC Ba\u010dka Topola, Serbia<\/p>\n Marko Stameni\u0107 (33\/3) Swansea City<\/p>\n Ryan Thomas (23\/3) PEC Zwolle <\/p>\n Strikers<\/p>\n Kosta Barbarouses (70\/9) Western Sydney Wanderers <\/p>\n Andre de Jong (11\/2) Stellenbosch, South Africa<\/p>\n Ben Waine (26\/8) Port Vale <\/p>\n Michael Burgess<\/a> has been a Sports Journalist for the New Zealand Herald since 2005, covering the Olympics, Fifa World Cups, and America\u2019s Cup campaigns. He is a co-host of the Big League podcast<\/a>.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"\u201cThis window has come too soon,\u201d All Whites coach Darren Bazeley told the Herald. \u201cI don\u2019t think he\u2019s…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":116417,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[3017,5263,95,13381,3276,23708,58595,2082,13085,3025,111,139,69,1118,3111,9617,24684,213,1557,165,28557,66754,5264,1533,1339,4883,379],"class_list":{"0":"post-116416","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-ahead","9":"tag-all","10":"tag-and","11":"tag-captain","12":"tag-chris","13":"tag-colombia","14":"tag-ecuador","15":"tag-for","16":"tag-matches","17":"tag-most","18":"tag-new-zealand","19":"tag-newzealand","20":"tag-nz","21":"tag-of","22":"tag-out","23":"tag-player","24":"tag-ruled","25":"tag-sports","26":"tag-squad","27":"tag-their","28":"tag-toughest","29":"tag-valuable","30":"tag-whites","31":"tag-will","32":"tag-without","33":"tag-wood","34":"tag-year"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/116416","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=116416"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/116416\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/116417"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=116416"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=116416"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/nz\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=116416"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}