Malta’s top sportsman at the moment, young Double Trap shooter William Chetcuti, added another honour to his already long list last night when he received the Platinum Award during the Malta Olympic Committee’s Awards Night at the Dolmen Hotel in Bugibba.

This year has been another successful year for Chetcuti. He won a Gold Medal in the World Junior Championships and at the Games of the Small States of Europe Andorra 2005. A few weeks later he participated in the Almeria 2005 Mediterranean Games where he kept his position by winning the Bronze Medal in the seniors event.

He also participated in the European Championships in Belgrade winning a Silver Medal in the junior event. At the ISSF World Cup, William smashed 141/150 clays. With this score he had to go for a shoot-off for a place in the finals.

He made it through and hit 47 clay targets in the finals. After another shoot-off for bronze or silver he smashed another three pairs to win the Silver Medal in the seniors’ category.

This made him the second best double trap shooter in the world with only Mohammed Al-Maktum, Olympic Gold medallist beating him so far.

Also highly successful was athlete Mario Bonello who received a Gold award and two Bronze awards.

The other awards went to the following:

Gold

Athletics 4x100m Relay Team (Jeandre Mallia, Rashid Chouhal, Mario Bonello, Darren Gilford), Carol Walsh (athletics), Angela Galea (swimming), Marcon Bezzina (judo), Simon Gerada (table-tennis) and Andrezei Makowski (table-tennis).

Silver

Athletics team 4 x 100m (Charlene Attard, Diane Borg, Therese Mallia, Lara Scerri), Martina Xuereb (athletics), Lisa Bezzina (athletics), Emmanuel Grima (shooting), Rashid Chouhal (athletics), Massimo Cremona (table-football), Kenneth Arpa (bowling).

Bronze

Athletics 4 x 100m team (Ivan Borg, Karl Farrugia, Nicolai Portelli, Mario Bonello), Women’s Squash team (Annabelle Diamantino, Joanna Rizzo, Sue Aquilina, Roberta Pace Grima, Liz Said), Roderick Muscat (cycling), Frans Pace (shooting), Darren Gilford (athletics), Nicolai Portelli (athletics), Mario Bonello (athletics), Charlene Attard (athletics), Rebecca Camilleri (athletics), Mark Spiteri (tenpin bowling).

During the Gala Night,ten persons were also inducted into the Malta Olympic Committee’s Hall of Fame.

These are John Bencini, a former sports administrator, Carmelo Costa, sports broadcaster, Alfred Griscti, undisputed best ever waterpolo player in the history of the game, Major Nestor Jacono, former top athlete, Lewis Portelli, sports broadcaster and journalist, John C. Ripard, a foremost yachtsman, Joseph Demicoli, former formidable swimmer, top class waterpolo player and a very useful footballer and Ruggieru Friggieri, one of the locally produced best footballers who was once described as the ‘Piccolo Diavolo Maltese’ (Little Maltese devil), Paul Giorgio, leading sports administrator and Fr Hilary, former football coach and sports journalist and administrator.