Exiles 10 Valletta United 12

(0-3) (3-2) (2-5) (3-2)

Exiles suffered another defeat at the hands of Valletta when they met last night at the National Pool. The Citizens had more vim in their display and merited the three points at stake.

Our boys had an awful start conceding four straight goals before a timid re-action in the second session brought the teams  closer and the encounter seemed more competitive. Half-way through the third session, Exiles also levelled at 6-6 before losing the grip of the match to trail once again three goals behind. In the last quarter, Exiles tried to reduce the gap but their re-action was feeble and our opponents controlled the last phase of the game by playing the clock.

One cannot expect to put a fight against another team of our level and give them a comfortable advantage so early in the match.  Our attacks proved to be sterile as Valletta defended their fort by simply zone shadowing without fouling our foreigners Sikulic and Katonas. There were several times when Katonas positioned himself for a shot at goal but that pass hardly reached that point. Other basic mistakes when blocking in defence cost us goals at crucial moments of the match.

Exiles Coach Maurizio Mirarchi kept pushing in an effort to save the day but the response from the water was weak. Our opponents did have that something better on the night but our boys did not make them harder to win. Two  positive features included a slick attack in the start of the third session and the poker scored by David Pace Lupi who continued to play despite a knock in the second part of the game.

Exiles had 9 man up situations and a penalty which was converted whilst we played man-down on 5 occasions.

The following players took part Ian Bugeja, Julian Rizzo Naudi, Simon Vassallo, David Pace Lupi (4 goals), Gergerly Katonas (3 goals), Diego Borg, James Spiteri Staines (1 goal), Kurt Griscti (1 goal), Luka Sekulic, Peter Borg (1 goal) and Kayne Lanzon.

The last outing in the Premier League is scheduled for Friday the 8th August 2014 at the National Pool at 20.00 hours when Exiles take on neighbours Sliema.

KaFa

photo by Adrian Farrugia

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