‘We started it all’: The first Football Ferns are still fighting to tell story

While much has changed since New Zealand won the Women’s Asian Cup in 1975, their triumph remains largely unrecognised

Isobel Kennedy can still remember arriving home in Auckland, New Zealand in 1975. She and her teammates had just won the first Women’s Asian Cup, and they were on top of the world.

Back home, they remained anonymous. Some family and friends welcomed them in their return from the tournament in Hong Kong, but there were no reporters, no cameras, no jubilant fans. There was no indication anyone was aware that New Zealand had won the first four international matches they ever played, to prevail as the inaugural women’s champions of a new continental competition.

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