Heimanu Taiarui has headlined some heroic performances from the Warrior Gods. He scored twice in Tahiti\u2019s 6-1 win over Argentina, in front a euphoric crowd in Papeete, in the FIFA Beach Soccer World Cup\u2122 quarter-finals in 2013. He was on target in normal time and the shootout as they reached the Portugal 2015 final. He thrived in the Pacific Islanders\u2019 stunning upset of IR Iran in the Bahamas 2017 semi-finals.<\/p>\n
Yet he ranks today\u2019s 4-3 win over Argentina as one of his favourites \u2013 and he didn\u2019t even make the score-sheet.<\/p>\n
\u201cIt\u2019s up there with the best of them,\u201d he told FIFA. \u201cWe didn\u2019t expect this. Argentina are an outstanding side. They have been in such good form. To be behind and to beat a team like Argentina feels amazing.\u201d<\/p>\n
Central to Tahiti\u2019s success was three goals coming from bicycle kicks.<\/p>\n
\u201cWe practice them all the time,\u201d explained Taiarui. \u201cWe have players who are specialists at this. It\u2019s one of our strong points. You saw that today.<\/p>\n
\u201cToday we scored three. It\u2019s not often you score three bicycle kicks it the World Cup, against a team like Argentina. Credit to the boys. Incredible goals.<\/p>\n
\u201cBeach soccer is crazy. It\u2019s so fun to watch. You see bicycle kicks, other spectacular goals. You always see teams coming from behind and winning. Argentina almost did that to us at the end. I think it was a great spectacle for the spectators. Thankfully we won.\u201d<\/p>\n
That victory was indebted to Jonathan Torohia, the firefighter who was named the Best Men\u2019s Goalkeeper in 2015 and, judging by his Player-of-the-Match performance, is still at the peak of his powers.<\/p>\n
\u201cJo is amazing,\u201d said Taiarui. \u201cIt\u2019s funny because we just expect all those saves from him nowadays. He always comes up with big saves at big moments. He gives you a chance of beating any team. We\u2019re all very grateful to have him.\u201d<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"
Heimanu Taiarui has headlined some heroic performances from the Warrior Gods. He scored twice in Tahiti\u2019s 6-1 win over Argentina, in front a euphoric crowd in Papeete, in the FIFA Beach Soccer World Cup\u2122 quarter-finals in 2013. He was on target in normal time and the shootout as they reached the Portugal 2015 final. He […]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":13,"featured_media":942696,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[20966],"tags":[9648,27192],"class_list":["post-942695","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","category-fifa-news","tag-fifa","tag-fifa-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/942695","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/13"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=942695"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/942695\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/942696"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=942695"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=942695"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/91varzeshi.ir\/portal\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=942695"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}