Reference to your article of the 29 April regarding the resignation of Mr. C. Farrugia from the post of assistant coach of the women's basketball national team, the MBA would like to clarify the following points:

1.The MBA would have preferred if prior to publishing the article the facts were verified.

2. Mr. Farrugia resigned from the post on Monday 24th April 2006

3. It is completely unfounded that Profs Coppa at any time informed the MBA that he would quit the post if Mr. Farrugia did not resign.

4. The President's Council had a meeting on Friday 21st April 2006 where the Commonwealth Games participation was discussed. Following this meeting, MBA representatives met Mr. Farrugia and he tendered his resignation from the post. For the record this meeting lasted not more that five minutes as Mr. Farrugia's resignation letter was already in his possession.

5. Late last week (28th April 2006) the President and Secretary General of the MBA had a meeting with Profs Coppa in Priolo to discuss the programme for the rest of the season till July when Malta will be hosting the Promotion Cup for women.

Frank Camilleri

MBA general secretary

NOTE: Mr Camilleri's clarification confirms that both he and the president were away from the island, the day the item about Farrugia's resignation was carried exclusively on this newspaper (Saturday 28 April). This, however, does not mean that no effort was made to contact them. In fact, there was absolutely no reply when I tried to contact them on their mobile phone before the item was published.

Henry Brincat

Sports Editor