Maltese Olympic Committee president Mr Justice Lino Farrugia Sacco yesterday named squad player Bradley Hindle Deguara as Malta’s flag-bearer at the Opening Ceremony’s march-past for the forthcoming Games for European Small Nations in Liechtenstein.

He said Deguara was an excellent sportsman and had always been exemplary, both on and off court.

The MOC president criticised the organisers of the Liechtenstein Games for allowing an enormous number of foreign athletes to take part in the forthcoming edition.

Addressing journalists on the day Team Malta for the Games was officially revealed, he said that it was evident the scope of these Games did not remain that as originally planned. He said that in the past, such Games helped athletes from the various small nations to develop and make progress. “Today it is quite clear that the intention of nations who use a large number of foreigners is that of winning the largest number of medals possible so as to acquire better sponsorships from their governments and others.

“Team Malta does not have many foreigners. There are only just a few and if someone asked me whether I would consider including a foreigner instead of a local athlete when these were more of less of the same level, I would obviously select the local athlete,” he added.

Farrugia Sacco insisted that it did not make sense for a country considered as one of the giants of these Games, that is Luxembourg, to take to Liechtenstein a Squash team consisting of foreigners only. “Neither does it make sense to have a Cypriot athletic team with 10 foreigners when everyone is well aware that Cyprus are already well ahead of all the others in that sector with their own athletes,” he said.

Farrugia Sacco said it would have been more appropriate for the organisers to include a clause which would have allowed contingents to have a 10 per cent quota for foreigners.

Asked whether the battle had been lost after he had made the same claims two years ago in Cyprus, Farrugia Sacco said it was not lost. “Of course, it has not been won. But I assure everyone that we will continue fighting our battle in the name of sport,” he said.

The MOC president also made a reference to the first participation of Montenegro. He said: “We welcome them into the fold. I think we will be seeing standards at these Games improving just because of their presence. They are strong even if they are taking part with a small contingent of 35. I am sure they will be even stronger in two years’ time when they will take part with a full contingent,” he said.

He also criticised the organisers on other things. “We were disappointed not to have sailing, shooting (clay-pigeon) and women’s basketball not included. We were hard-hit by these decisions. As to sailing, we know they Liechtenstein is not close to the sea. As to the others, it was their prerogative to decide on which disciplines to include for the Games. And here we accept their decision. What we did not accept was their proposal to remove the individual squash competition. We considered that very unfair and here I have to thank the European Olympic Committees for their successful intervention to convince the organisers to stage the singles events.”

Farrugia Sacco also thanked the British Olympic Association for their help in making it easy for David Millar to take part in the team time-trial in the cycling event. “Let us make it clear that David was born in Malta, spent some months after his birth here, and also is in possession of a Maltese passport,” he said.

Then he went on to thank his colleagues at the Maltese Olympic Committee, the officials of the associations involved, the athletes and their families, all of whom had made a lot of sacrifices in the best interest of Maltese sport.

Farrugia Sacco also said that the Maltese contingent will be paying a courtesy visit on the President, Dr George Abela, next Wednesday afternoon. The group will be accompanied by Double Trap shooter William Chetcuti, who is now an MOC ambassador in sports. “Although he is not taking part in the Liechtenstein Games, he is an inspiration for our athletes,” he said.

Asked about the prospects of the Maltese at the forthcoming Games, Farrugia Sacco said he will only be satisfied if the results were good.