APIA, Samoa, Aug 29 (bdnews24.com/Reuters) - David Brand wears a seemingly permanent grin of enthusiasm about his face despite having arguably one of worst coaching jobs in world soccer.
As trainer of American Samoa, the 199th ranked team in the world, he is virtually guaranteed to lose every game. The quest for the Manchester-born coach is to limit the number of goals conceded.
"If we had lost by under double figures that would have been a victory for us," he said after the island nation opened its 2010 World Cup qualifying campaign with a 12-1 thrashing at the hands of the Solomon Islands.
American Samoa are among 10 countries competing in the football tournament at the South Pacific Games in Apia.
The competition is being used by the Oceania region as the first stage of its World Cup qualifiers. The top three finishers will progress to a group competition with New Zealand but Brand's ambitions are less lofty.
Before the start of the competition on Saturday, Brand said his team's goal was solely to perform a little better than they had previously.
That would seem achievable given that American Samoa, an island group of some 60,000 inhabitants, created World Cup history with a 31-0 loss to Australia at Coffs Harbour in 2001 in the qualifiers for the 2002 finals in Japan and South Korea.
They conceded a further 26 goals in three other qualifiers in the same group competition.
HIGHEST HONOUR
In the last World Cup qualifying campaign for the 2006 finals in Germany, American Samoa conceded 34 goals in four games but managed to score one of their own.
"It's naturally a little bit embarrassing for us, but that's all in the past," says the former Wigan Athletic player.
"We are very much a developing country which has had very few facilities for the sport in the last 10 years. We have not had a senior league for the last five years so picking players has been difficult."
Most of the players were based locally but there were a couple who had returned from the United States to play in the tournament, he said.
However, none of their college-based players were able to make themselves available for the competition.
"There were three or four, who were contacted, who were keen but at the end of the day other commitments came before playing for their country, which for me is hard to fathom," said Brand.
"We still have to teach our people that football is the number one game in the world and playing in the World Cup is the highest possible honour."
'BIG PROGRESS'
Brand had been pinning his hopes on goalkeeper Nicky Salapu, who was on the receiving end of the 31 goals hammered in by the Australians six years ago.
But Salapu, the sole survivor from that team, missed a connecting flight from Hawaii ahead of the tournament and Brand had to turn to 17-year-old Jordan Penitusi, who had never played a senior game before the World Cup qualifiers.
A keen Penitusi showed some acrobatic skills, bouncing the ball around his penalty area basketball style, but also made a stream of basic errors in the 12-1 loss to Solomon Islands and a 7-0 defeat by neighbours Samoa in their derby on Monday.
It was American Samoa's 22nd successive loss since becoming a FIFA member in 1998, eight of the defeats coming with a margin of 10 goals or more.
Brand was still hopeful Salapu would make it for the rest of the tournament, which will see American Samoa play two more matches against Vanuatu and Tonga.
But there has been one bright spot for Brand already -- a second World Cup goal for the country lying joint bottom of the FIFA world rankings.
The coach bounced off the bench in joy as Ramin Ott converted a penalty against the Solomon Islands.
"We got a goal," he said with a grin. "That's big progress for us."
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