Michael Woud was among Auckland FC's first-ever signings. Photo / Jason Oxenham
When Michael Woud signed with Auckland FC, he wasn’t just joining a brand-new football club – he was stepping into an opportunity to play at home.
One of the first through the door, the 26-year-old goalkeeper looked destined to own the No 1 jersey in the team’s inaugural season.
It made sense. His timing was right. His credentials were solid.
And in those early weeks, it was easy to picture the former Sacred Heart College student patrolling the goalmouth at Go Media Stadium, rousing the crowd with fingertip saves and commanding the backline.
But football rarely sticks to the script.
In a move few saw coming, the Bill Foley-owned club secured Alex Paulsen on loan – one of the A-League’s most talented goalkeepers.
As Paulsen was signed to English Premier League club, AFC Bournemouth – but had most recently played for Kiwi rivals the Wellington Phoenix – the move was a masterstroke.
Paulsen’s signing to the top club was deserved. He had been a key figure in the Phoenix’s most successful season, making 29 appearances and keeping 12 clean sheets on their journey to the semifinals.
In that 2023-24 A-League season, he had taken out three of the league’s post-season awards, including Goalkeeper of the Year, Fans’ Player of the Year, and joint Young Player of the Year.
Securing Paulsen – without paying a transfer fee – simultaneously strengthened Auckland FC and ignited a bigger rivalry with the Phoenix in one fell swoop.
But for Woud, it was a curveball that altered his role from likely starter to guaranteed understudy.
Instead of defending the goalposts on game day, he spent the season as an observer – training, watching and waiting.
Now, more than a year after his arrival at the Black Knights, Woud looms as Auckland FC’s number one No 1, given Paulsen’s return to his parent club.
Despite the highs experienced by Steve Corica’s side as they were crowned regular-season champions in their remarkable debut campaign, Woud was forced to be patient.
He had to bear the unwanted tag of being a second-choice goalkeeper, arguably the most difficult job in the game, where the team’s best interest means you’re not playing.
“It was difficult, obviously I’d come back to play, and that wasn’t able to happen because A.P. [Paulsen] came – and I had to accept it,” Woud told the Herald.
“I’d be lying if I said it wasn’t hard. It was.
“It hit me pretty hard. I didn’t expect that that would happen, and it did happen.”
Among a group of Auckland FC’s first signings in May last year, Woud returned to his hometown with professional club and international experience.
Across almost a decade, he had played in England with Sunderland AFC, in the Netherlands and most recently with Kyoto Sanga in Japan.
Woud was the starter between the sticks for New Zealand at the Tokyo Olympics, helping them advance to the knockout stage for the first time. He’s been to three age-group Fifa World Cups and received his first All Whites cap in 2017.
He’s made six appearances for the national team since, with the All Whites boasting arguably the strongest goalkeeping stocks in the history of New Zealand football.
In 2018, Woud rejected an offer to represent the Netherlands’ Under-18 team – being eligible for both nations through his ancestry.
However, above all else, his desire was to represent Aotearoa.
Sitting on the bench for a year, though, has dealt Woud a damaging blow in his bid to push for a spot in coach Darren Bazeley’s squad for the 2026 World Cup.
Every goalkeeper at every club wants and needs competition from his teammates; that’s not in dispute.
However, in Woud’s case, signing under the guise of being the first-choice stopper, only to be sidelined by Paulsen’s arrival, wasn’t something he anticipated, even as both he and the club dealt in good faith.
“There’s an indication from both sides of the club and from what the player would expect,” he said.
“I always knew they were going to sign another goalkeeper – I thought they don’t have a good chance to play whoever they brought in.
“But they brought in the goalkeeper who got the best goalkeeper of the year [award] the year before, which was always going to be difficult to play ahead of him.”
Woud admitted accepting the fact that his playing time might now be limited was particularly hard around the time of Paulsen’s official announcement and the media storm that followed.
“[It was] tough at the beginning ... Getting the vibe that A.P. was going to start most of those games.
“It’s just important sometimes to put your ego aside and what you’re personally trying to achieve in the game.”
Throughout his season, as he waited in the wings, goalkeeper coach Jonathan Gould was honest in his assessment of Woud’s role within the Black Knights.
“What [Gould] spoke to me about a lot last season is ‘you’re very far away from playing, but at the same time, you’re not’.
“A.P. didn’t get injured, he didn’t get sent off, but a goalkeeper can get injured at any moment of the game and you might be called upon.
“You might go to a game thinking you’re not going to play, and then you might have to play after the first minute.
“So you feel far away, but in reality, you’re not as far away as you think.”
Woud said his mindset was forced to shift.
“It’s a team sport and just helping A.P. prepare for the game the best I could and ... making sure that I was ready if I got an opportunity and seeing the team do well on the weekend and being part of that, even though it was on the sideline, was still a cool experience for me.
“[Having] patience and just understanding that my time would come eventually, so just to work every day and focus it one day at a time.”
There was no animosity between Auckland’s first and second goalkeepers. Paulsen, Woud and third-choice keeper Joseph Knowles continued to challenge each other on the training field.
“We had a really good relationship with each other and, ultimately, his playing well, which he did, will help the team do well. I wasn’t hoping he’d make mistakes.
“I think he learned something from me and I learned stuff from him.
“The best thing for me last season was that A.P. and I showed there was a lot of respect between us and we would train really hard.
“When we kicked the balls at each other, we would kick them really hard because we knew ultimately that would make us better.
“A.P. does things better than me and it’s just picking up on small things that you could maybe bring into my game.”
Keeping Woud motivated was knowing that Paulsen was on loan for one season.
“It meant that it was just about doing my best to make sure that I was given the opportunity this [upcoming] season to play, and not giving any of the coaches any doubts about playing me.
“That was a big motivation, and just also being able to look myself in the mirror and say that I trained hard today and regardless of the situation, playing or not, that I’ve done my best.”
All going to plan, Woud will make his debut for Auckland FC in their Australia Cup match against the Gold Coast Knights on July 29.
It will be 630 days since he last played an official football match for his Japanese club team in November 2023.
He said he doesn’t feel pressure to back up Paulsen’s incredible efforts last season.
“What he did was great, and it helped the team a lot and ultimately, you can’t try to copy what he’s done, all that. You can just take one game at a time and do your best.
“You can’t control what he did, or other people’s expectations.”
When Woud makes his home debut for the Black Knights at Go Media Stadium when the new season gets under way in October, he said he’ll stay positive, soak up the occasion and treasure every minute on the pitch.
“In football, it’s also important just to enjoy what you’re doing and enjoying what you’re doing is also concentrating and making sure that you do your job for the team.
“Obviously, you get nervous in that, which is okay, but [I’ll be] just trying to help the team to win the game ultimately.”
Bonnie Jansen is a multimedia journalist in the NZME sports team. She was named New Zealand’s Best Up and Coming journalist in 2025. She’s a football commentator and co-host of the Football Fever podcast and was part of the Te Rito cadetship scheme before becoming a fulltime journalist.