The Malta FA’s membership with UEFA and FIFA 50 years ago meant that our association obtained a passport for the national team, and eventually other representative teams, to participate in European and FIFA competitions. Club teams also entered the fray.
Apart from friendly international matches played, the first being that against Austria on 24 February 1957, the first competitive match Malta took part in was against Denmark away on 28 June 1962, an encounter valid for the European Championship. That opened the door for over 300 matches for our national team.
However, the subject of this particular text is being limited to mark the MFA’s membership with UEFA and the Maltese club teams’ participation in European competitions.
Hibernians were the first to make their bow in the European Cup of Champions in season 1961-62 with a match against Servette of Switzerland. In the same season Floriana made their debut when they played Ujpest Dosza of Hungary.
Hibernians were again the first Maltese team to play in the UEFA Cup in 1968-69 against Aris Salonika of Greece. Floriana opened the account in the Intertoto Cup in 1994-95 when they met Tirol Innsbruck of Austria. Birkirkara and Valletta started off the Maltese trail in the Europa League early this season.
As for the women’s club competitions it was a first for Birkirkara in the UEFA Champions League.
It was the start of a long trail of matches which saw great teams like, Real Madrid, Manchester United, Barcelona, Benfica and Inter, among others, facing teams from tiny Malta.
Adverse results for our sides were the order of the day in 49 seasons of competition in the European Cup (later the Champions League), 38 in the now defunct Cup Winners Cup, 40 in the UEFA Cup and 11 in the Intertoto Cup, now both changed to Europa League.
Our teams managed to survive the first or preliminary rounds on 11 occasions in these competitions, five in the European Cup, three in the Cup Winners Cup, twice in the UEFA Cup and once in the Intertoto Cup.
Sliema Wanderers have the best record when qualifying for the next round four times. They are followed by Hibernians and Floriana, who each qualified twice, while Hamrun, Birkirkara and Valletta, have one qualification to a subsequent stage.
All in all, it has been an endearing experience for our teams and also an opportunity for the Maltese to witness some of the best European club outfits in our midst – this courtesy of our admission in the international fold 50 years ago.
Refereeing experiment on agenda of UEFA EXCO meeting in Malta this week
The experiment with five match officials is one of the key points on the agenda for the UEFA Executive Committee’s first meeting of the year, to be held in Malta on the afternoon of Thursday 28 January and the morning of Friday 29 January.
Other items on the agenda are the UEFA EURO 2016 bid process and the UEFA Grassroots Day on 19 May.
The Executive Committee, chaired by UEFA president Michel Platini, will hear an update on the experiment involving five match officials which is being undertaken at fixtures in the 2009/2010 UEFA Europa League on the proposal of the UEFA president, following the FIFA Executive Committee’s approval at its meeting in Nassau, Bahamas, last summer; and after previous experiments in the UEFA European Under-19 Championship in autumn 2008.
The experiment is that in addition to the match referee and two assistant referees on the touchline, two extra assistants are placed behind the goalline with the mission of focusing on incidents that happen in the penalty area, such as fouls or
misconduct.
The meeting of the Executive Committee will take place at the Grand Hotel Excelsior in Floriana, and is scheduled to end at noon on Friday 29 January.