Arrivederci, Rob

(CBS)  This will come as no surprise to regular viewers of Survivor: Marquesas: Rob lied.

In fact, the construction worker from Massachusetts, who was booted off the island in the latest episode, told the anchors of The Early Show he was “lying through the whole game. You got that right.”

Twenty-six-year-old Rob Mariano admitted that lying was the strategy he chose to win the reality TV game and its $1 million prize. He came up short when the tribal council chose him, from among the 10 contestants left, to leave the island.

“We’re just playing a game,” he said. “That’s the biggest thing you really need to understand. This was a game. If I was like this in real life, then I’d have some serious problem.”

Rob also admitted he met his match in John, the self-proclaimed leader of the tribe, and said, “I really appreciated that spirit of that game from him.”

In the end , it might have meant his downfall.

“Pretty much whatever he told me, I did the exact opposite,” Rob said. “I mean, he was pretty much offering me a spot in the final seven, and my whole thinking was, ‘Who is he to offer me a spot?’ And he did have the numbers, true. But in the long run, it didn’t matter to me if I finished in ninth place, third place or second place. I was there to win. And I was going to do everything I could to win.”

Rob was questioned about his bond with Sean Rector, who has been described by other contestants and viewers as an angry man, an idiot, a knucklehead and a whacko.

“I think, first of all, Sean is a great guy. I really do,” Rob said. “But nothing, no buts. He’s not lazy or angry. He’s a teacher. I mean to be a teacher.…”

He said he and Sean connected on the first day. “And we never really had a spoken alliance, but we kind of had a little unspoken one. And Sean remained loyal throughout the course of the time that I was there with him.”

He said he also made an alliance on the first day with Sarah . “I wouldn’t have voted her out for anything,” he said. “I really wouldn’t have.”

Did he have regrets ?

“I think I played my way,” he said. “And my game - and it was a game, and I did it the way I wanted to. I lied. I was deceitful about it. But I did it out in the open.

“That’s the way I wanted to play the game. But in the end, that’s what probably got me booted.”