Playoff chance for NZ after holding France to draw

WELLINGTON: New Zealand yesterday played out a goalless draw against host and tournament frontrunner France in its second game at the Under20 Women’s World Cup.

The result keeps New Zealand’s slim chances of progressing to the next round alive, following its openingmatch loss to the Netherlands, which leads the group with two wins.

The Junior Football Ferns must now beat Ghana, which is pointless after two matches and has already been eliminated, in its final group A match on Monday and hope the Netherlands can do it a favour by beating France to advance to the knockout stage.

France is second with a win and a draw while New Zealand is third on one point and Ghana last.

In an absorbing encounter played at a high intensity throughout, France dominated possession as expected in front of its boisterous fans but the Junior Football Ferns had a clear game plan and executed it to the letter to keep their hopes of progressing past the group stages alive.

‘‘I’m really proud of the performance from the girls. We set them a pretty honest challenge to be better in certain areas from the first game and they certainly delivered on that today,’’ coach Gareth Turnbull said.

‘‘To be able to back up and go toe to toe with one of the best teams at this tournament — and have a proper game where both teams had opportunities — is amazing. I was pleased with the application of the tactical stuff but it was more the character, the heart, the aggression and the energy which they had heaps of.’’

Despite New Zealand now having a chance to progress with a win over Ghana, Turnbull is keeping his feet planted firmly on the ground.

‘‘It’s a little bit out of our hands so we’ll just focus on what we can control,’’ he said.

‘‘Ghana are a challenge and have a lot of very good individual players but we also believe there are some gaps there from a tactical perspective which we can exploit. If we go out and do the job then anything is possible.’’ — RNZ