Football: The One Trophy Auckland FC Have No Chance Of Winning

Monday, 12 May 2025, 6:35 pm
Article: RNZ

Mathew Nash, Sports Contributor

Auckland FC have learned who their opponents are in the A-League playoff semi-finals as they bid for an unprecedented double trophy win. Success in a potential Grand Final would follow a Premier's Plate triumph in their debut campaign. But despite the possibility of a silverware-laden first season, there's one trophy the Black Knights may never get their hands on.

In the same week Inter Milan and Barcelona played out an all-time classic in the UEFA Champions League semi-final, it's perhaps clearer than ever to Auckland that continental success in the AFC or OFC Champions League is simply out of reach.

As a New Zealand side playing in a predominantly Australian league, Auckland find themselves in a strange limbo when it comes to continental representation. Australia, despite their proximity to Aotearoa, are members of the Asian Football Confederation (AFC). That makes the AFC Champions League the ultimate goal for A-League sides.

However, New Zealand remains in the Oceania Football Confederation (OFC), with the All Whites, Football Ferns and New Zealand National League operating under OFC's framework. As New Zealand-based sides, Auckland and the Wellington Phoenix are therefore ineligible for the AFC Champions League Elite.

Just over a week ago Saudi champions Al-Ahli, with a side captained by Roberto Firmino, won the AFC Champions League Elite against Japanese side Kawasaki Frontale in front of 60,000 fans in Jeddah. Not only did they take home the USD $10 million prize, the result also means they advance to the FIFA Club World Cup and another lucrative pay day.

It's a reality the Phoenix know all too well. In 2020, after finishing third in the regular season, Phoenix's AFC Champions League play-off spot was handed to fourth-placed Brisbane Roar instead - though Covid-19 ultimately scuppered their involvement anyway.

The premise of a team from outside a confederation playing in a league governed by it has always been a delicate one for the AFC. In 2009, tensions rose when the AFC briefly insisted Football Federation Australia count Kiwi players within the five allocated foreign player slots for the Phoenix.

The incentive? A potential pathway to the AFC Champions League Elite. But the move would have called the club's future into question, essentially forcing them to become an Australian team with only a sprinkling of New Zealanders. Curiously, this came just after the All Whites had qualified for the 2010 FIFA World Cup at Bahrain, an AFC power-broker's expense - fuelling terrace chatter of unfounded conspiracies. Ultimately, it was a storm in a teacup, but it highlighted the uneasy alliance between governing bodies.

It's an alliance Auckland have now joined, and they'll be loath to poke the bear - leaving Melbourne City, runners-up in the A-League regular season, to take Auckland's place in next season's AFC Champions League Elite.

What about the OFC, then? They do have a Champions League of their own, one New Zealand sides have dominated since Australia's abdication in 2006. But for Auckland and the Phoenix, that door is firmly shut too.

The OFC Champions League is open only to top teams from New Zealand's non-professional National League. As professional clubs, Auckland and the Phoenix are ineligible. Even their reserve sides, which compete in the domestic league, cannot qualify, as per NZF's National League regulations. Just last weekend, Auckland FC Reserves beat 13-time OFC Champions League winners Auckland City in the National League's regional phase - but no matter their success, the continental route remains closed.

Auckland and the Phoenix now stand as the only two professional football clubs in the world that are ineligible to play in any continental club competition. That global distinction is important, as it also bars them from a potentially lucrative place in the revamped FIFA Club World Cup.

That could change with the launch of the OFC Pro League. But after early interest in including Auckland and the Phoenix, the federation now appears to have cooled on the idea - particularly if it involved reserve teams, or as OFC secretary-general Franck Castillo labelled them in February, "B-teams."

So while a historic domestic double may be within reach for Auckland FC, it seems likely they'll never grasp continental gold unless there's a dramatic shift in football's regional dynamics. Perhaps that's simply the price of having professional football in Aotearoa.

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