Capital buzzing as soccer's crunch day looms

Wellington city is going off at the prospect of a victory for the All Whites tomorrow. Photo / Mark Mitchell

Vacant hotel rooms in Wellington right now are as scarce as New Zealand's appearances in World Cup soccer finals.

The one or two rooms remaining will set you back a cool $800 for the night.

It's all quite incredible when you think about it.

This weekend in Milan, home to two of Europe's great football sides, people are going rugby mad and 80,000 will cram into the San Siro to watch the All Blacks take on Italy.

At the same time, Wellington, one of the staunchest rugby cities in the country, is abuzz with football and the All Whites' high-stakes World Cup playoff with Bahrain.

Wellington is ready for it, and they can't wait. More than 35,000 will squeeze into the Cake Tin on Saturday night for what will be the biggest crowd for a football match in this country.

If it could hold 50,000, those extra tickets might have sold as well because even the likes of Olympic gold medallist Hamish Carter was asking around this week if he could get his hands on a ticket while the nefarious types on Trade Me are trying to cash in on other's desperation.

Banners with New Zealand Football's 'one shot at glory' slogan adorn the streets. Sports shops have All Whites merchandise front and centre and one shop is totally dedicated to selling New Zealand football paraphernalia while playing the cheesy anthem in the background.

Hotels are booked up. Enquiries yesterday found two rooms available in the city - one had a $650 asking price and the other was going for $800 - while some fans plan to arrive in the city late tomorrow afternoon and party (or drown their sorrows) all night negating the need for a hotel bed.

Even Wellington's local paper, The Dominion, got into the act with a football wraparound containing chants and gameday information and the entire back page of the sports section was devoted to the match. Wellington seems to have forgotten the All Blacks are playing a test.

The Dominion even mischievously printed the name of the hotel the Bahrain team are staying at and suggested readers use that information in whichever way they chose (English tabloid The Sun famously hired an oompah band to play continuously outside the hotel of the German team before their World Cup qualifier with England in 2001). Bahrain are staying at the five-star InterContinental, by the way, in Grey St, near the base of the cable car.

Any disruption would round off an already disturbed buildup for the visitors. Their 44-strong entourage have jetted into town late yesterday and almost immediately they ran into issues. Firstly, the were unable to unload their luggage for an hour after landing because it was too big, they then ran into a traffic jam trying to get to the hotel and it was doubtful they trained as planned last night as their baggage played catchup.

They also won't enjoy the southerly blast complete with a hailstorm due to hit the city this afternoon.

It is gearing up to be a memorable weekend. It's just up to the All Whites to make sure they will be good memories.

- HERALD ON SUNDAY