Having established a partnership with French club St Etienne in November 2012, AS Tefana are able to send their U-11 and U-13 sides to France in June to participate in a tournament being run by the French Ligue 1 club.
However, senior team coach Laurent Heinis says the club was keen to also find somewhere to send their U-16 side in order to evaluate the capacity of those players.
“The Tahitian player is central to the Tefana philosophy. We know that gateways exist today between the amateur world and the professional world and we want our youth to become aware of this and work towards it accordingly,” Heinis says of Tefana’s motivation.
“Two Tahitian players, Marama and Pascal Vahirua, are now retired former professionals and Pascal has been integrated into the management of the club to share everything he knows and help another young Tahitian player make the leap.”
Heinis says the visit arose after he got in touch with Asia Pacific Football Academy Managing Director Andy Smith.
APFA is a partner of the Oceania Football Confederation, as well as New Zealand-based A-League side Wellington Phoenix through the Wellington Phoenix Football Academy.
A visit was made in February this year, by Heinis and a colleague, to scope out the facilities in Wellington and negotiate the potential for 18 players to travel to New Zealand.
On 8 May the squad arrived and spent ten days completely integrated in the WPFA education, through Scots College, and football environments alongside the full-time Academy attendees.
With the WPFA providing the professional backdrop, the ten days were an eye opener for the Tahitians.
“Our players were filmed during training and during the first game we played. And each time there was a debriefing on the content,” Heinis says.
“Watching themselves was something new for our players, but it allows more rapid progress and correction of errors.”
He says overall the group adapted well to the new environment and the pace of each day which consisted of morning trainings, English classes, activities and either a match, more English lessons or training in the afternoons.
Heinis says while the focus is football, there are plenty more reasons why the club brought this squad to New Zealand.
“We want them to discover another country – the culture, the language and the climate – as well as experience the challenge of playing against local footballers who are training six days out of seven,” he says.
“We have come here to learn and progress.
“The coaches at WPFA are very professional. They shared their experience and their way of working to help our group advance. The sharing of knowledge can only help us get better.”
Heinis lauded the trip as a huge success and says the club would love to see it become a regular exchange with either coaches or teams journeying to New Zealand, or being welcomed in Tahiti at AS Tefana.
For more on Tahiti football go to www.ftf.pf

Share