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It feels apt following a 2026 World Cup draw featuring tiny island debutants Curacao and Cape Verde to revisit Next Goal Wins, an underdog story I adopted upon first watch as if it were a team I would loyally follow for the rest of my life.
The documentary chronicles the world’s (once) worst soccer team, American Samoa, and their valiant efforts to qualify for the 2014 World Cup, but to label it merely a soccer film is to overlook a perfect study of remarkable characters, circumstances and a lesser seen island life. You don’t need to be a sports fan to be uplifted here.
We begin with the American Samoa national soccer team’s worst ever day at the office: a world record 31-0 drubbing at the hands of Australia in 2001, still the worst loss in international soccer history. Goalkeeper Nicky Salapu is the only player that remains from that fateful day, and despite his upbeat persona, the scars remain. The cloud of defeat still follows the team everywhere.
The cameras touch down on the island as the team is preparing for the South Pacific Games in New Caledonia. American Samoa have never won a competitive game and are rooted to the bottom of the Fifa rankings. Their facilities are modest, training sessions need to work around players’ multiple job and church commitments, and the island’s talent pool is limited by a small population and the inevitable exodus of young men leaving to join the US military. In training, shots fly comically wide and over as if the goal itself is repelling them, dribbling skills are no better as drills play out against the island’s idyllic background of lush, forest covered mountains.
The Football Federation of American Samoa reportedly rejected multiple approaches from TV and film crews prior to the filming of Next Goal Wins in fear of mockery. In contrast, directors Mike Brett and Steve Jamison tread carefully throughout the film, never patronising or belittling their subjects, while still capturing humour with a delicate and compassionate eye.
The team do little to challenge their reputation at the South Pacific Games but coach Larry Mana’o still sprinkles the positives when he can. “They needed nine goals today – you gave them only eight. It’s a step. These are steps all going in the right direction.”
Desperate times call for desperate measures, so the US Soccer Federation puts out a job posting for a coach. One person replies: Thomas Rongen, a former soccer player and coach, originally from the Netherlands and looking for a different kind of challenge. We later find out that the death of Rongen’s teenage daughter in a car accident is part of his motivation, and this adds to a simmering pot of emotion bubbling throughout the film, which finally spills over when the team later achieves the impossible. Scoring a goal, that is. A first ever win soon follows. Cue air punches and tears in the cinema the first time I watched the movie, from sports fans and phobics alike.
Rongen starts as a strict, professional presence but soon softens up, embracing an island culture that is deeply religious, accepting and loyal. Everyone has a role to play, be it scouted addition to the squad Rawlston Masaniai, who qualifies to play through his paternal grandfather, or top scorer Ramin Ott, who is forever being mistaken as a Mexican on his army base.
Despite Rongen suggesting early on that trans player Jaiyah Saelua is unlikely to feature in qualifying, Saelua goes on to become the first ever trans player to play in a World Cup qualifying game, supplying the movie’s most crunching tackles and crucial blocks.
As a fa’afafine, the Samoan third gender, Jaiyah is not only supported and accepted by her team-mates, but openly celebrated as part of a wider masculinity exhibited in the film that struck me as inspiring. Get yourself a man who does a traditional Samoan war dance but also isn’t afraid to cry in public and who protects the dolls, both on and off the pitch.
Needless to say, American Samoa never made it to Brazil for the 2014 World Cup, but they did manage to climb 18 places in the Fifa rankings to 186th, earning a 100% certified fresh rating on Rotten Tomatoes along the way (the less said about the Taika Waititi remake, the better). As far as underdog stories go, you would struggle to write a better one from scratch, let alone scout such a special cast.
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Next Goal Wins is available to rent digitally
