Former Norwich City captain Neil Emblen will take charge of New Zealand Under-23s' bid to qualify for the 2012 London Olympics football competition.
Emblen, who left England to join the now defunct New Zealand Knights, is coach of Waitakere United and has acted as a technical assistant for the Kiwis this year.
The London 2012 qualifiers are in March in Fiji, where a nine-team qualification tournament will decide Oceania's sole spot at the 16-team finals.
If New Zealand qualify for the finals, they could call up eight full internationals, but Emblen may be without most of his overseas-based players because clubs are not required to release players for the qualifiers.
He said: 'The elements and conditions are against you a little bit but I'm confident that with the quality of the ASB Premiership boys and the lads from the US we can go over there and qualify.'
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