Hammers Abroad in November: Winston Reid, New Zealand miss World Cup after Peru defeat

2018 will be another summer of rest for Winston Reid. Unfortunately for him, that means that he will not be playing at another World Cup.

For the second consecutive qualification cycle, Reid sees his country New Zealand fall short of playing at the global final tournament at the last hurdle, as the Kiwis fell to Peru 2-0 in the second leg in Lima late on Wednesday night. This comes four years ago after Reid and other New Zealand star Chris Wood were unable to play in their nation getting thrashed by Mexico in their intercontinental playoff then.

For Reid, captaining his side for the last time, it was a valiant but fruitless effort in the end. He was fortunate to avoid a handball in the 25th minute.

He and the Kiwis weren’t fortunate the rest of the way on, as Peru scored the crucial opener in the 28th minute when Jefferson Farfan finished sublimely to send the Lima crowd wild.

A scoring draw would have still sent New Zealand through, and it showed the urgency that Peru needed to have to score a second. And the CONMEBOL side did just that, when Christian Ramos made sure party time in Lima would happened with a goal in the 65th minute.

Winston Reid is now back on the long flight to London to rejoin West Ham. But the pain of missing the World Cup once again at the last stage will certainly linger for him.