00:05The Oceania Football Confederation is FIFA's smallest and most overlooked.
00:14It contains just 11 full members.
00:18All Pacific Island nations stretching from New Zealand in the south to Papua New Guinea in the north.
00:28Australia were founder members of the OFC in 1966, but they left in 2006 to join the Asian Football Confederation.
00:40Australia and New Zealand are the only countries to qualify for the Men's World Cup as members of the OFC.
00:47The Socceroos accomplished the feat in 1974 and 2006, the All Whites in 1982 and 2010.
00:59Those four appearances have delivered a return of just one solitary victory.
01:08The expansion of the World Cup Finals means teams from the region will be guaranteed further opportunities to improve on
01:14this record.
01:16But the standard of football is so historically poor, it will take an enormous transformation for anything resembling competitiveness on
01:26a consistent basis.
01:30Since Australia left, New Zealand have been the dominant force in the OFC, but their average rank over the past
01:3730 years has been around 100 in the world, only very occasionally piercing the top 50.
01:47Behind them, Fiji and New Caledonia are the only other nations to periodically graze the top 100.
01:57The reasons for such lowly status are obvious.
02:01Most of the members of the OFC contain tiny populations, with only New Zealand and Papua New Guinea measuring in
02:09the millions.
02:12And there is the lack of economic development, meaning many members lack the infrastructure to support a high-performance football
02:19community.
02:23On top of that, some of these members do not consider football a priority sport.
02:30New Zealand is a world-renowned rugby union nation, while Papua New Guinea is obsessed with rugby league.
02:39A further consideration is the status of many Pacific Islands as dependent territories.
02:45For example, New Caledonia is enshrined in the constitution of France.
02:51So when a talent emerges, like Christian Carambeur, they are absorbed into the French pathway.
03:00Carambeur's roots were celebrated when he helped France win the 1998 World Cup, and he remains the most significant player
03:07to emerge from the region.
03:10For that reason, he is often the de facto spokesperson for football in the area, such as with the recent
03:16expansion of the Club World Cup and how it can benefit the OFC.
03:29When you have this opportunity to take part in an international competition like the World Cup, you obviously need to
03:35be ready and to focus on the tournament.
03:40It means that ahead of it, professionalization work needs to be carried out in terms of resources, be it human
03:46or material resources.
03:51It also requires appropriate sports facilities, which meet the elite level standard.
04:00So yes, integrating and including several teams in this competition drives local and regional development within both confederations and countries.
04:15Unlike FIFA's other confederations that operate to service the game from the very top down to the grassroots, the OFC
04:22is more strongly focused at the entry level.
04:25In the world's first place to be the most effective, in the middle of the country.
04:25Facilities, participation, structure.
04:32Although should New Zealand follow Australia into the AFC, the rationale for persisting with the OFC diminishes.
04:40but that eventuality seems some way off with the recent women's world cup co-hosted by
04:46australia and new zealand an example of how the confederations can operate effectively in tandem
04:55we we are in a good space with regards to oceania but we are also on the doorstep of
05:00asia and uh you know we share a lot of cultural um similarities and we share a lot of opportunities
05:07to collaborate further between asia and oceania so that partnership which you've seen in the
05:13women's world cup bid and the hosting uh is only the beginning of how the two confederations could
05:19work together in the future the 2023 women's world cup is the only major international competition
05:26ever to be staged in the ofc and hopes are high that its success will drive long-term growth for
05:32football
05:33in the region we have another first for this tournament and it's the first time that we've
05:40brought both the member associations the confederations and fifa together to look at legacy
05:48and it's for the tournament so it's not just about legacy now it's about legacy beyond at the end of
05:54the tournament how are we working together to elevate the game to increase participation
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