The All Whites go into Thursday morning’s Oceania World Cup qualification final against the Solomon Islands as hot favourites - but they may have to make some sacrifices as they keep an eye on the bigger picture.
The winner will compete in June's do-or-die inter-continental playoff but some players are walking a disciplinary tight rope thanks to a physical semi-final against Tahiti.
The All Whites emerged from the 1-0 win with three players – Liberato Cacace, Winston Reid, and Alex Grieve - on yellow cards.
If they pick up another in Thursday’s final, they'll be suspended for June's playoff which looks likely to be against world No.42 Costa Rica.
"We need to be really clever about how we deal with it," All Whites coach Danny Hay said.
"It's a tough one."
Hay wouldn’t hint which way he was going with his selections though.
"You're sort of trying to hedge your bets a little bit, " he said.
"I guess you are damned if you do and damned if you don't. It’s a little unfair if I’m being honest.
"Ultimately this is not the last stop for us. We want to be there for the intercontinental playoff in June.
“And we want to know that we can put our best 11 on the pitch there."
Veteran striker Chris Wood said the team is confident it has built sufficient depth to deal with issues like these though.
"If we were coming into these games without playing, I think it would have been very difficult to blood a lot of new players, a lot of new youngsters."
Thursday’s game kicks off at 6am NZT.
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