SANTIAGO, April 4 (Xinhua) -- Uruguayan manager Martin Lasarte insisted on Tuesday that his spell in charge of Chile was not a failure despite the team's inability to qualify for this year's FIFA World Cup.

The 61-year-old Uruguayan was sacked last week, less than three days after Chile ended their qualifying campaign with a 2-0 home defeat to Uruguay. The result left the Roja seventh in the 10-team South American group, five points shy of a playoff spot.

"I am not afraid of the word failure," Lasarte told reporters on Tuesday. "It's clear that we did not achieve our goal of qualifying for the World Cup, but it does give us certain satisfaction that some less relevant objectives were reached."

Lasarte guided Chile to seven wins, six draws and nine losses after replacing Reinaldo Rueda in February last year.

He said the team's qualifying chances were hurt by injuries to experienced players and fixture difficulties.

"There were things that we had to face in these qualifiers that affected us in some way. They made us play three straight away games and that can't happen again."

According to Chilean media reports, Gustavo Quinteros, Sebastian Beccacece and Eduardo Berizzo are among the candidates to replace Lasarte. Enditem

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