With the All Whites missing qualification, New Zealand's profile at the Football World Cup in Qatar has been fairly low key - but one brazen Kiwi visitor has kept the flag flying by crashing Italian TV coverage of the event.
Colourful football correspondent Tanc Palmeri was interrupted during a live cross from Doha Beach, when a woman passed behind him, pinching his butt on the way.
Palmeri ushered his assailant back on camera, joined by her companion, where they revealed they were from New Zealand and UK respectively.
"Nothing to see here," Palmeri later tweeted. "Only a New Zealander bikini girl in Doha squeezing my bum, while I'm on air, then asking for support to her Welsh girlfriend... and finally ending segment by sipping beer."
The encounter left studio hosts bemused by their colleague's antics, but the Italians have had to take a more detached view of this year's World Cup, after the Azzuri - four times winners, most recently in 2006 - also failed to reach the tournament through European qualifying.
