Football at the 2007 South Pacific Games – Men's tournament

Men's Football at the South Pacific Games 2007

Tournament details
Host country	Samoa
Dates	25 August – 7 September
Teams	10 (from 1 confederation)
Venue(s)	1 (in 1 host city)
Final positions
Champions	New Caledonia (5th title)
Runners-up	Fiji
Third place	Vanuatu
Fourth place	Solomon Islands
Tournament statistics
Matches played	24
Goals scored	110 (4.58 per match)
Attendance	13,000 (542 per match)
Top scorer(s)	Osea Vakatalesau (10 goals)
← 2003 2011 →

The 2007 Pacific Games men's football tournament was held at the Toleafoa J.S. Blatter Complex in Apia, Samoa in from 25 August to 7 September 2007.^[1]

The men's tournament formed the first stage of the Oceania Football Confederation's (OFC) qualification tournament for the 2010 FIFA World Cup and the qualification tournament for the 2008 OFC Nations Cup.^[2]

Tournament

The final accredited athlete list at the SPG website Archived 2007-11-07 at the Wayback Machine shows 10 entered sides. Papua New Guinea, although listed by FIFA as having applied for the 2010 World Cup, did not enter. Tuvalu did enter (although they were not eligible for the World Cup). The group stage draw, undertaken by Tim Cahill, was held on 12 June 2007 in Auckland, New Zealand.

New Caledonia's captain, Pierre Wajoka scored a ninth-minute penalty against Tahiti in the opening fixture of the games, earning him the distinction of being the scorer of the first goal of the 2010 FIFA World Cup qualification process.

Group seedings

Group A	Group B
Fiji – 153rd  Tahiti – 173rd  New Caledonia – 175th  Cook Islands – 198th  Tuvalu – N/A	Solomon Islands – 161st  Vanuatu – 168th  Samoa – 189th  Tonga – 190th  American Samoa – 199th

Notes:

• Tuvalu was unranked by FIFA as it was not a member (and not an entrant to the World Cup).
• Although the draw took place in June, FIFA rankings are shown as of February 2007, which accords with press reports of the rankings used in the draw seeding.

Squads

Group stage

Group A

Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
Fiji	4	3	1	0	25	1	+24	10			1–1	4–0	4–0	16–0
New Caledonia	4	3	1	0	6	1	+5	10				1–0	3–0	1–0
Tahiti	4	1	1	2	2	6	−4	4					1–0	1–1
Cook Islands	4	1	0	3	4	9	−5	3						4–1
Tuvalu[a]	4	0	1	3	2	22	−20	1

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Group B

Team	Pld	W	D	L	GF	GA	GD	Pts
Solomon Islands	4	4	0	0	21	1	+20	12			2–0	3–0	4–0	12–1
Vanuatu	4	3	0	1	23	3	+20	9				4–0	4–1	15–0
Samoa	4	2	0	2	9	8	+1	6					2–1	7–0
Tonga	4	1	0	3	6	10	−4	3						4–0
American Samoa	4	0	0	4	1	38	−37	0

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Knockout stage

	Semi-finals				Final
	Solomon Islands	2
	New Caledonia	3
					New Caledonia	1
					Fiji	0
	Fiji	3
	Vanuatu	0
					Third place
					Solomon Islands	0
					Vanuatu	2

Semi-finals

Third place match

Final

2007 South Pacific Games winners
New Caledonia Fifth title

(Note): The three medallists, New Caledonia, Fiji, and Vanuatu, advanced to the 2008 OFC Nations Cup (together with automatic qualifier New Zealand).

Advancement questions

Tuvalu

There remained some uncertainty as to what procedure would occur to Tuvalu advance - as they were not members of FIFA (and therefore did not enter the 2010 FIFA World Cup). While no explicit ruling was communicated on this matter, comments in the press release for the OFC Second Stage draw referred to "nine eligible nations", suggesting that Tuvalu would not have advanced to the OFC Nations Cup regardless of their performance in the South Pacific Games. Had Tuvalu finished in a medal position, the fourth place team would presumably have qualified for the next round of qualifying with the other two medal winners and New Zealand. Tuvalu's early elimination from the competition put an end to any complication over the qualifying process for the next round.

This was the first time ever that a non-FIFA nation has competed in the World Cup.^[4] The closest situation in the past was the case of New Caledonia during the 2006 World Cup qualifiers. However, they were at the time in the process of accession to the organisation, and were eliminated from contention for the finals just days before their final admission to the FIFA family.

Papua New Guinea

Papua New Guinea, having initially entered the 2010 World Cup and indicated their intention to enter the South Pacific Games, were involved in a dispute with their sporting authorities and failed to meet the official accreditation deadline for the South Pacific Games. This meant they were effectively disqualified from the World Cup.

Goalscorers

There were 110 goals scored in 24 matches, for an average of 4.58 goals per match.

10 goals

9 goals

7 goals

5 goals

4 goals

3 goals

2 goals

1 goal

1 own goal

See also

• Pacific Games
• Football at the 2007 South Pacific Games – Women's tournament

References