Oman 2017 Home U23 matchworn?

Here is a slightly battle damaged design. Traditional red and white colouring with an interesting take on traditional stripes. However, the stripes stop in the middle and overall quality is poor (otherwise known as “Jako”). The badge has also massively spilt into the shirt itself, though the having numbers helps and the typeface is quite nice, though just the country name is an unimaginative thing to put on the back.

Looks to have been used solely by the U23 side, mainly in the 2018 AFC U23 Championship qualifiers, where they came back from a goal down to thrash Kyrgyzstan 5-1 with 4 goals from the 80^th minute! They also beat Iran 2-0 to qualify (as Sri Lanka withdrew) for the final tournament. It may have also been used across U23 friendlies in the period which were generally successful, with draws against Algeria and Cameroon and victories against Jordan and Turkey.

Typically unspectacular but regularly competing sums up the Omani national side. That and regularly changing shirts, something they should perhaps calm down a bit on. They’ve never been to a World Cup, tend to be involved in low scoring games and regularly win around half their matches. Despite some better performances for tournaments like the Asian Cup and various Arab nations cups, Oman remain frustrated. 4 Asian Cup appearances has led to only 1 knockout round appearance (in 2019) and they’ve never qualified out of their group at the Pan Arab Games, the Arab Nations Cup or the Asian Games.

No women’s side has ever played a full international, like many of their neighbours, though they have had some 5 and 7-a-side appearances which went poorly. The U23s and U20s follow a similar pattern to the senior team, with fewer tournament appearances and a similar lack of success, though the U23 Asian Games has provided a quarter-finals appearance. In contrast, the U17 team has 2 AFC U16 titles and a 3^rd place to their name (from 1994 to 2000) and even came 4^th in the 1995 U17 World Cup!

The Omani national futsal team doesn’t play regularly and hasn’t entered AFC competition since 1992 where they failed to qualify. Perhaps unsurprisingly, they’re much better at Beach Soccer! Once champions and twice runners-up at the Asian Beach games, they also have four top 3 finishes at the AFC Beach Soccer Championship, qualifying for every tournament since 2009. They went to the 2011, 2015 and 2019 World Cups but only have a win against Costa Rica and one against Nigeria to show for it.

Aside from a loss away in Qatar, Oman’s qualifying for 2022 is well underway. They’re expected to qualify for the third round but, as ever, the top teams will likely prove to be too much for them.

Norway 2010-12 Home

Northern Ireland 2006-08 Home

Nigeria 2010 Away

Nicaragua 2004-05 Away

New Zealand 1984-87 GK, benchworn Frank van Hattum v Newcastle United
New Zealand 2001-03 Home
New Zealand 2012-2013 GK

Let’s start with the spectacular. Beautiful maroon colour, with subtle stripes across the front adding a little to it. The stripes also go along the sleeves and are front and rear, detail that’s often missed out in modern shirts. Being black, the collar, sleeve cuffs and bottom stand out nicely, though are vast. Both logos are white and contrast very well and the typeface for the numbers is beautiful, with a lot of detail to them. Material is lovely too, very high quality from the Sport Chicken. No, there’s not a huge amount of detail to it, but a lovely shirt regardless.

Used across 1986 World Cup qualifiers, New Zealand failed to qualify, falling 3 points (and 12 goals) short of Australia. They managed comfortable 5-0 and 5-1 victories over Chinese Taipei but struggled away from home, losing 2-0 to Australia and 3-0 to Israel, opponents where they got 0-0 and 3-1 results at home, respectively. This led them to finish 3^rd in the OFC group, behind Israel on goal difference, but well ahead of Chinese Taipei, who failed to gain a single point.

Next up is a decent effort from Adidas. Sharp contrasts of black and white, but enough white to leave it as the dominant colour, without making it too plain. Both white and black on the collar and sleeve cuffs add a bit of detail and we have both the traditional fern leaf along with the great, old ball logo. The colours make it work as well as it does, even matching the tag in the collar to give a very clean aesthetic.

The shirt was first used in their 2002 World Cup qualifying campaign, where they put 5 goals past Tahiti (5-0) and the Solomon Islands (5-1), only narrowly beat the Cook Islands 2-0 and finished off with a flamboyant 7-0 thrashing of Vanuatu to win the group with a 100% record. Sadly, this pitted them against a strong Australia side, who defeated them 2-0 in New Zealand before soundly defeating them 4-1 in Australia to reach the play-off round. Next up was the 2002 Nations Cup where they defeated Tahiti 4-0 before annihilating Papua New Guinea and the Solomon Islands 9-1 and 6-1. A 3-0 victory over Vanuatu put them into the final where they gained a small measure of revenge, edging the Australians by a single goal to nil.

Lastly, a very standard Nike GK template, with radiating concentric circles from the logo (which is at least properly centred) and plenty of breathable holes down the side. Deep red colouring all over though, it is nice but there’s no real variety to it and that only takes away from it. No pattern on the back either, it could definitely do with a few, minor touches to help make it into something.

Red was a rare colour for it, but the template was used across the 2012 Nations Cup and 2014 World Cup qualifying. The Nations Cup will forever be remembered as a disaster, with New Zealand managing narrow victories over Fiji (1-0) and Papua New Guinea (2-1) before drawing 1-1 with the Solomon Islands. On its own, this wouldn’t be too bad, they still topped the group, but then New Caledonia defeated them 2-0 to hand the title to a team outside of Australia and New Zealand for the first time ever.

2014 World Cup qualifiers drew from the 4 semi-finalists, with New Zealand playing New Caledonia, Tahiti and the Solomon Islands, winning every away game 2-0. At home they were more variable, but a late goal led to a 2-1 win over New Caledonia and they were comfortable against Tahiti (3-0) and the Solomons (6-1). Sadly they were hammered 5-2 and 4-1 by Mexico in the inter-continental play-off to miss out on the World Cup.

Typically New Zealand are terrors of Oceania, even when Australia were part of the confederation they had the potential to get results. In 1973 they won the inaugural Nations Cup and have 4 other titles to their name besides. Typically when they’ve lost, it has been to Australia, but not always, with them never having consecutive Nations Cup titles to date. Across their 4 Confederations Cup appearances they have managed only a single draw, against Iraq, struggling. But, despite the inter-continental play-off, they have been to two World Cups, once in 1982 (3 losses) and in 2010 (3 draws), the latter where they were the only unbeaten team.

On the women’s side New Zealand have reached levels beyond terrifying. They’ve lost twice to Chinese Taipei and 5 times to Australia, taking 2 titles, four 2^nds and one 3^rd when Australia were in the confederation. Since then, across 4 Nations Cups, they’ve scored 144 goals and conceded 1. Their narrowest margin of victory was 3-0 over Papua New Guinea and then 6-1 over Tonga. Utter dominance. Otherwise they managed a handful of draws across 5 world Cups and an Olympic quarter-final, along with two Algarve Cup 4^th places. Nothing enormously special, but they’re still a strong side. On the youth side, all the sides follow a very familiar pattern. The men have been to three Olympic Games, reaching the quarter-finals in 2020 (out on penalties) with 4 titles, three 2^nd places and 1 disqualification. The U20s have been to 6 World Cups, reaching the Round of 16 three times, but have been more piecemeal in terms of OFC titles, though they have 5 from their last 6 attempts… The U17s have lost 1 OFC game since Australia left, taking 7 titles from 7 and have been to 9 World Cups,, including 3 Round of 16 appearances. The women only lost the 2002 OFC U20 Championship, taking all 10 other titles (conceded 6 goals and scored 391) to reach 8 U20 World Cups (best quarter-final so far) and 6 U17 World Cups, reaching 3^rd place in 2018!

Moving onto futsal and beach soccer, New Zealand have managed five 3^rd places and three 2^nd places from 10 OFC Futsal Championships, currently not quite able to top the Solomon Islands. This has meant that they’ve never reached a Futsal world Cup. They’ve been much less active in beach soccer, only showing up to the 2007 Championship, which they hosted. They lost all three games, falling 9-5 to Tahiti, 4-3 to the Solomons and 10-8 to Vanuatu!

With Oceanian qualification for 2022 an unknown, it is hard to be certain of anything. But New Zealand will be expected to take the inter-continental spot and will be disappointed if they do not. What happened then, is anybody’s guess. It should be against the Asian team, so they’ll hope for a decent chance at a 3^rd ever World Cup.

Netherlands 2010-12 Away

Nepal 2015-21 GK
Nepal 2019-21 Away

Myanmar 2013-15 Home

Morocco 2004-06 Away Matchworn by Rachid Tiberkanine v Brazil U20
Morocco 2010 Away

Ah, the classic Total90 template, it spread like a mildly attractive plague across football kits. There’s a little green on the right sleeve as well as all across the collar and name but otherwise we’re left to rely on the red piping to carry the rest of the white shirt. I’m not certain it quite does the job but, with all the match detailing, it is pretty reasonable. The sleeve flag and the circle around the front number (why did they do that?) just about add enough.

Used across several tournaments, the main were the 2006 AFCON and 2006 World Cup qualifiers. They made the AFCON from those qualifiers, but draws to Egypt and Libya along with a loss to the Ivory Coast sent them home straight from the group stages. Disappointment also came in the form of missing out on the World Cup. Despite being unbeaten in the group containing Tunisia, Guinea, Kenya, Botswana and Malawi, 4 away draws (only beating Botswana) left them a singular point (and several goals) behind Tunisia, who took the only qualification spot.

From one classic template to another, we have Puma’s template that was given to almost half of CAF. Morocco were certainly no exception, receiving this green number with red sleeve cuffs. Their shoulder pattern was simple, but elegant for it, consisting solely of the star from the flag. I’m still not a fan of the asymmetrical material and that’s a little compounded by the fact that it is green as a home kit when red feels the more natural home colour for them. But it is a lovely green and a nice enough shirt so these things can be forgiven!

Used across 2012 AFCON qualification, Morocco made the tournament after topping a tricky group containing Central African Republic, Algeria and Tanzania. After 6 games only 6 points separated top from bottom but Morocco drew home and away to CAR, beat Algeria in both games and traded wins with Tanzania to come out 3 points clear of their closest rivals.

These results are fairly typical of modern Morocco, though they’ve got a storied history and should never be underestimated. They’ve been to five World Cups, reaching the knockout stages in 1986 and consecutively qualifying in 1994-98. However, 2018 was their qualification since 1998. Their sole AFCON title came as far back as 1976, with their best performance since being 2^nd in 2004, though they reached 3 semi-finals in the 1980s. Twice knocked out of qualifying on away goals, Morocco have reached every African Nations Championship since, leading to back-to-back titles in 2018 and 2020 to show the strength of their league. They’ve also been very active in minor tournament, primarily with other Arabic nations, and have a plethora of obscure titles from these.

A little less intimidating on the women’s side, Morocco haven’t been to a World Cup or an Olympics and haven’t qualified for the AFCON since 2000. They were eliminated from both 1998 and 2000 in the group stages but only on goal difference in 1998. Their recent performances have been poor in qualifications, not coming close, but they have shown some promise in other tournaments, with 3^rd in the 2019 African Games and gold in the 2020 UNAF Tournament. From U23s to U15s they’re one of the most successful nations in the UNAF tournaments, with numerous titles and high finishes, though this doesn’t translate as well to the confederation wide performance. That’s not to say they’ve been unsuccessful, with a 2^nd place at U23 levels, 4 first round exits at the Olympics, 3 U20 World Cups (including a 4^th place!) and a Round of 16 exit in the 2013 U17 World Cup. Women’s youth football has been fairly variable, with both UNAF U20 titles to date and 2^nd in the sole U21 edition. Their progression in CAF youth tournament has mostly been through walkovers, with the major powers proving to be very much a step too far.

Active in both futsal and beach soccer, Morocco won the most recent two Futsal Cup of Nations titles and have been to two World Cups, exiting both at the group stage. They’ve qualified for the next World Cup, though that was delayed due to the pandemic. They fell short of Libya in both of their UNAF tournament appearances to date, but still rank amongst the best African futsal sides. Beach soccer has been much quieter, with Morocco reaching 3 semi-finals but mainly finishing in the middle of the pack, with about a 50% win rate. The likes of Nigeria and Senegal are just too far ahead of them currently.

Drawn in a group with Guinea, Guinea-Bissau and Sudan, Morocco are expected to progress to the world Cup play-off. Anything can happen there but morocco will be confident. A lack of goals might be a concern, with their AFCON exit hanging heavy in the mind so nothing is guaranteed.