Solomon Islands will take on Tahiti for their opening match of 2016 the Oceania Futsal Championship which also serves as the Oceania Futsal World Cup Qualifiers.
This was revealed by the Oceania Football Confederation (OFC) last Sunday.
The Solomon Islands national futsal team, Kurukuru will battle against the Tahiti national futsal team tomorrow at 8pm at the Vodafone Arena in Suva, Fiji.
This is anticipated to be an entertaining match between the two bitter rivals.
Kurukuru understands that Tahiti is one of the competition’s strong contenders with a very strong determination to take away the title from the Oceania champions this time round.
Tahiti came so close to beating the Kurukuru team in the previous Oceania Championship with an impressive 4-1 lead in the first half.
Kurukuru came back later in the second half with a more difficult style of play which saw them level the score half through the second half and extended the lead to win 6-4.
Tahiti made some sweeping changes between 2013 and 2014 and as we approach February’s world cup qualifier we can see they’ve used both experiences to help create a squad they believe capable to taking the title.
However the Kurukuru boys are said to have matured and more experienced than in the previous championships.
In a recent talk with Star Sports, team captain Elliot Ragomo said they are going into the competition to defend the title they have won for the past years.
The Kurukuru team is led by Brazilian coach Juliano Schmeling, who also travelled with the Kurukurus to Thailand as a technical advisor in 2012.
Since his appointment as the Head coach for Kurukuru, the Kurukuru team has done very well in their recent outings.
Two weeks ago they played two friendly matches against the Australian national futsal team.
They lost 4-2 and 3-0 which despite the defeat was so far the best score since they had international friendly matches with Australia.
The most recent friendly match saw them defeat Mountain Majik Futsal club 14-5 preceded by a 12-0 thrashing against Dural Warriors futsal club.
Previously the Futsal whites beat that same Team Majik 4-2 on friendly.
By CARLOS ARUAFU
