Sport: 'World Class' Tahiti inspire at Beach Soccer World Cup

Transcript

PAUL TOOHEY: In the end yeah the mighty Brazil - one of the big football countries - was too strong but we're really proud of Tahiti to get to the final again is incredible really and to think, for the size of the country, to achieve so much on the world stage is a real inspiration to all the people working in Oceania in football.

VINNIE WYLIE: You go through the whole tournament and only side Tahiti lost to was Brazil?

PT: Yeah twice, that's right: 4-1 and 6-0. Then you look at some of the other powerhouse countries they played: Japan and they played the European champions (Poland) and Paraguay so sometimes a cliche to talk about punching above your weight, because I know they've put a lot of effort and resources into really being a strong beach soccer team but it's fantastic. Then of course the semi-final yesterday was a story in itself against Iran - a really gruelling penalty shootout where nobody seemed like they wanted to win it - to get to the final. I wonder if it took its toll in the end. I'm not sure really because the guys they're used to playing games every second day so I think they can be very proud of their efforts.

VW: The Tiki Toa are the one true Oceania team that really are not just competitive on an international stage but right up there fighting for titles - legitimately one of the best in the world?

PT: World class - a true world class team - and I think that's something, coming back to what I was saying, about being an inspiration: I think we can look to how they've gone about it and they've actually achieved it and in a short period of time, over the last ten years, when Tahiti chose to focus on the diverse forms of the game, such as futsal and beach soccer. It was around 2006 and by 2011 they were the champions of Oceania and that's really when the Tiki Toa, this side that we know, came together for the first times so in six years they've achieved an incredible amount really. To think that they finished fourth (at the 2013 World Cup) and then two second places i think really shows the countries of Oceania. Particularly because, if we're looking at the beach and the environment, many of the countries have environments that are conducive to playing beach soccer so I really hope that that's something that we can all look at and say that we want to do it too and some of the other countries will want to get more and more involved in beach soccer in the future.