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Football in Vanuatu has enjoyed several milestone achievements, both on and off the field, in recent years and participation in the very first FIFA Series in March is the latest step forward for the beautiful game in the Pacific island nation.
FIFA’s new initiative allows member associations more regular opportunity to face national teams from other continents in friendly matches, and serves to unlock technical development opportunities previously unavailable. Its pilot phase was initiated during the March 2024 window in the Men’s International Calendar ahead of a full roll-out in 2026 with the FIFA Series only staged in even years.
The FIFA Series was particularly poignant for Vanuatu after heartbreakingly being forced to withdraw from FIFA World Cup™ qualifiers in 2022 due to the impact of Covid-19. It was a tough blow for one of a handful of Oceania Football Confederation (OFC) nations where football is unquestionably the number one sport.
Vanuatu took to the field in Jeddah, Saudi Arabia, for their opening FIFA Series game, recording a 6-0 defeat to Guinea in what was their first meeting with African opposition. They followed that with an unlucky 3-2 loss against Brunei Darussalam in only their sixth match against an Asian team, and just their eighth game ever against a non-OFC opponent.
Vanuatu Football Federation President Lambert Maltock says the new tournament provides an invaluable development tool for Pacific nations.
“Vanuatu, like any other small nations in Oceania, finds it difficult to play any other bigger football nations,” said Maltock, a FIFA Council member and current OFC President. “All year round, we compete amongst our OFC nations only, so to raise our ranking and performance standard.”
“This new initiative undertaken by FIFA allows Vanuatu, like all other smaller countries, to have an opportunity to play a more competitive international competitions thereby raising our performance and measuring our level of football against some other countries in other continents.
“We believe we have many skilful players, but there is no opportunity to expose them. [The FIFA Series is] a great learning experience and exposure, which can bring additional knowledge into building a new or innovative football culture from which we can benefit and direct our football planning, development and drive into new competitive platforms at international level.”
Last year, FIFA President Gianni Infantino visited the Melanesian nation with an inspection of the new 6,500-capacity Freshwater Stadium – constructed with FIFA Forward funds – in Port Vila the highlight of the visit.
