All Whites head coach Fritz Schmid has called for his young team to be more clinical in their second game of The HERO Intercontinental Cup in India.

The World No 133, who dominated their opening game against Kenya before going down 2-1 at the Mumbai Football Arena, take on World No 121 Chinese Taipei in what shapes as must-win match for both teams to stay alive in the tournament.

India defeated Kenya 3-0 last night in Monsoon-like conditions to remain unbeaten which means Kenya, New Zealand and Chinese Taipei are fighting for the final place in the final on 10 June.

Meanwhile, Chinese Taipei are looking to bounce back after they went down 5-0 to tournament hosts India in the opening game.

Schmid said his team learned a great deal from their narrow loss to Kenya and he wants to see those learnings put into practice tonight.

“Obviously we were disappointed coming away from the game against Kenya with empty hands, but on the other side we analysed our performance and also made our players very aware, there were a lot of good elements in the game and in our structure,” said Schmid. “The goal is soon enough that we have to get some sort of result out of it.” 

Schmid said he and his technical staff learned that they have a team that has plenty of good qualities and they have a team that can put certain elements on the pitch.

They had a good week of training in Auckland and some decent days training in Mumbai, considering the conditions and the climate. “I could see [against Kenya] that the boys are willing and also capable, the have the qualities to put our plan into practice”.

The frustrating part, from a New Zealand point of view, was despite dominating the game for long periods and being the better team in the first half they did not manage to secure a result from the game.

There were a handful of good scoring opportunities in the first half which were not converted aside from Sarpreet Singh who finished a fine strike for his first goal for the All Whites.

“We also learned a very old story that if you are in control of the game and you create scoring opportunities then you better put one or the other in the back of the net because it might cost you. With our mistakes we invited them back into the game and they benefited from it,” said Schmid. 

“Confronting an experienced team like Kenya, who have an average age of 26, and we are a young team on the pitch and that is exactly what we are looking for. You learn most from failure and as much as it hurts, and as much as we would like to have a positive result, I hope that will stick and we have an opportunity [against Chinese Taipei] to show how we can improve certain aspects.”

The All Whites final pool game of the tournament is on Thursday night against World No 97 India. 

The HERO Intercontinental Cup
New Zealand v Chinese Taipei 
Mumbai Football Arena
Tuesday 5 June, 2018
Kick off 8pm, (2.30am, 6 June)
Live on SKY Sport  

New Zealand (from); 1. Max Crocome, 2. Sam Brotherton, 3. Nikko Boxall, 4. Te Atawhai Hudson Wihongi, 5. Moses Dyer, 6. Tim Payne, 7. Cam Howieson, 8. Henry Cameron, 9. Alex Rufer, 10. Noah Billingsley, 11. Jai Ingham, 12. Nik Tzanev, 13. Justin Gulley, 14. Andre de Jong, 15. Clayton Lewis, 16. Dane Ingham, 17. Myer Bevan, 18. Matthew Ridenton, 19. Thomas Doyle, 20. Adam Mitchell, 21. Liberato Cacace, 22. Sarpreet Singh, 23. Michael Woud 

Chinese Taipei (from):  Pan, Wen-Chieh, Tsai, Shao-Che, Chiu, Yu-Hung, Chen, Hung-Wei, Chen, Ting-Yang, Hung, Tzi-Kuei, Chen, Wei-Chuan, Cheng, Hao, Tu, Shao-Chieh, Wang, Ruei, Wu, Yen-Shu, Chao, Ming-Hsiu, Donkin, Will, Lin, Chang-Lun, Chen, Chao-An, Chen, Yi-Wei, Chen, Sheng-Wei, Chu, En-Le, Wang, Chien-Ming, Chen, Ching-Hsuan, Li-Mao, Chen, Hao-Wei, Wei, Mao-Ting