Ben Waine's Journey to the World Cup: From League One to Glory

Ben Waine was nowhere near a World Cup when he fell out of the Port Vale squad. Not on the bench. Not in the plans. Just another frustrated forward in League One, watching matchdays pass him by.

Now he is heading to what Gianni Infantino grandly calls “104 Super Bowls” with a very different outlook.

“It has been a tough season. I'm not going to lie,” he told Sky Sports. There were weeks when his name did not appear on the teamsheet at all. “It sucked in the moment but it was probably one of the best things to happen to me. I was really able to work on my game.”

Port Vale slid out of League One, but Waine’s own campaign bent in the opposite direction. The turning point came on a raw March night, in the FA Cup, against Sunderland. Vale needed something to cling to in a bleak year. Waine provided it.

He scored the winner.

“It made a tough season a little bit more bearable,” he said. It was not luck. It was the product of repetition, detail and a stubborn refusal to drift.

Hours on the training pitch with individual coach Simon Ireland changed him. “Literally, every day we would work on one or two types of finish, just focusing on the technique,” Waine explained. He hunted for composure, for a finish he could lean on without thinking, a habit rather than a hope.

“It was about trying to find that composure, that finish that I could go to without thinking so it became instinct. It gave me real purpose. I knew what I was working towards. Even when things were not going well, I had that to work on. It made me relax a bit more.”

The irony is that the goal that came to define his season was a header. Most of the work had centred on striking the ball cleanly. Yet the Sunderland moment still belonged to those sessions.

“Because I was so desperate to do well, I was rushing actions in front of goal,” he admitted. The solution was repetition and imagination. The header that beat Sunderland had been in his mind long before it dropped out of the Staffordshire sky.

“The second finishing drill we didn't do a huge amount of but I did a lot of visualising of it off the field as well. And the one goal that I actually pictured was that Sunderland goal, the kind of loopy header back across the goalkeeper. I had actually visualised it.

“It does not seem like one you would practise when you are just working on the technique of hitting the ball but that action of going across the goalkeeper is one we had worked on and it just became a bit more natural. It was really cool to see that come off.”

The celebration sealed it. Waine, whose family are Newcastle supporters, turned to the travelling Sunderland fans and raised one arm in that unmistakable Alan Shearer salute. A little mischief, a little homage, and a stadium “absolutely bouncing.”

“It was just awesome. I had never seen the stadium like that before,” he recalled.

It was one of eight goals for Port Vale, numbers that spoke of a player who had finally grasped his chance. “I kind of took it with both hands. It sounds silly but I actually enjoyed playing my football again.”

That enjoyment had not always travelled with him. Waine left Wellington Phoenix in January 2023 for Plymouth Argyle, stepping into League One and straight into the realities of English football.

“I knew the jump to League One would be big. Not technically, but in terms of intensity and physicality, the adjustment was massive,” he said. Then Plymouth went up. The dream promotion brought a fresh problem.

“And then you get this amazing promotion and you are playing Championship football all of a sudden. It almost came too quickly.”

He still found moments. A couple of Championship goals, including one at Elland Road against Leeds United, hinted at what he could offer. But the rhythm never truly settled. A loan to Mansfield, intended to bring minutes and momentum, did neither.

“That just did not work out at all.”

The easy option hovered in the background. Go home. Reset in New Zealand. Waine refused.

“I promised myself that however hard it got I was not going to go back. That would have been the easy option. I stuck it out and have come out of it as a better player and a better person.”

Now the reward stands in front of him in giant letters: World Cup.

He is no stranger to big stages. Two Olympic Games with New Zealand have already put him in the glare. “France in the Velodrome was an awesome game to be a part of.” Yet he knows this is different. “It is going to be another level up.”

The All Whites have been feeling that level rise in recent months. Waine scored in a 4-1 win over Chile in March, but the rest of the build-up has been bruising: defeats to Colombia, Ecuador, Finland, then Haiti and England.

“You have to realise that when we are stepping up and playing harder opposition, we cannot expect the results to be perfect. We have had to mentally adjust.”

He might have to adjust on the pitch as well. Waine calls himself “a running nine” who likes to “press hard and get in behind the opposition,” the classic modern centre-forward. New Zealand, though, already have one of those. Chris Wood remains the country’s standard-bearer.

So Waine has broadened his game. Time at Port Vale has seen him pushed wide, learning new lanes and new pictures.

“At the start, I was a bit hesitant but I see it as a really positive thing. It just felt really natural. I am actually playing on the left, on the right and down the middle now. It adds another dynamic, which should help my case.”

There will be no talk of dislodging Wood. That is not the battle. The task is to be ready when the coach turns and points.

From Wood, New Zealand’s record scorer, Waine has taken something more subtle than movement or finishing drills.

Patience.

“As a striker, you can barely touch the ball all game but when that one chance comes, you had better take it. He has proven time and time again that he can do that.”

One chance. That is what Waine is chasing now.

“There is going to be that opportunity to be the hero. You just want that one moment.”

New Zealand open against Iran, then face Egypt and Belgium. On paper, it is unforgiving. In Waine’s mind, it is something else.

“My first thought was that we have actually got a chance here. Everyone sees us as underdogs but we want to take the opportunity that is in front of us. We want to get our first win on the world stage and we want to get out of the group for the first time ever.”

He laughs when the subject of Mohamed Salah’s shirt comes up. “I am assuming there will be a few people pulling rank.” The souvenir he really wants is less tangible and far more enduring.

A World Cup moment. A goal that lives on highlight reels and in New Zealand’s football folklore. Maybe, if it comes, the Shearer celebration returns too. “Maybe it will reappear,” he said, still smiling.

Everything circles back to the same idea: giving himself the best possible shot when that instant arrives.

“To squeeze the most out of my potential.” That is how he frames it. After what he calls “a lot of ups and downs,” he has dragged himself into position, ready for the ball to drop out of the sky again.

“It just has to be taken really.”