We lost 10-0 but we won Brazilian hearts, says Tahiti coach
The 43-year-old coach was philosophical despite thedown-hearted result after his team were beaten comprehensively by thereigning world champions
Tahiti boss
Eddy Etaetabelieves his team can leave the Confederations Cup with a sense ofpride having "won over hearts" following Thursday's 10-0 defeat to
Spain.
TheSouth Pacific islanders, who sit 137 places below their Spanishcounterparts in the Fifa world ranking, were demolished by Vicente delBosque's men, with Fernando Torres (four), David Villa (three), DavidSilva (two) and Juan Mata scoring the goals.
However, the43-year-old is philosophical in defeat and believes his team achievedwhat they set out to do - win affection from the general public.
"It’squite difficult when you get thrashed 10-0 but my players tried toreally play football. They did their utmost to perform as well aspossible - but at some point you've got to defend your goal better," hetold reporters.
"We had overwhelming support from all the publicin the Maracana. It’s very very important to us. We wanted to reach thehearts of the Brazilian public and I think we’ve done that.
"We lost the match 10-0 but we won over hearts in Brazil. I want to say a big, big thank you to the Brazilian public."
Meanwhile,Etaeta went on to appeal to people in Tahiti to acknowledge the sportin their home country and believes the result can prove beneficial inthe long-term.
He added: "To be honest, we are more well knownhere in Brazil than at home in Tahiti. I hope that we get morerecognition and support from our own population when we get back toTahiti.
"We realised it would be almost impossible to competewith such high level teams here but we are drawing a number of lessonsfrom this tournament for the future."
Tahiti face off against Uruguay in their final game of Group B in the Confederations Cup.
http://www.goal.com/en/news/5327/confederations-cup-2013/2013/06/21/4063297/we-lost-10-0-but-we-won-brazilian-hearts-says-tahiti-coach
