I refer to Paula Psaila Soler’s letter on TMID Monday 26 September and am amazed at how puerile one can be…!

Let me say from the outset that hiding behind initials is not in my style. In every correspondence, I have always signed the way I did as in my letter to your newspaper last week. Anybody following the local water polo scene knows that my name is synonymous with Neptunes.

Stating, as your correspondent did, that ignoring the winter league by The Times was an attempt to give the impression that Neptunes made a clean sweep of honours this year, is tantamount to distorting the facts as published in The Times on 13 September.

Again, I stress that the article on the said day never said that Neptunes swept the board during 2011. It only refereed to the summer competition, as the winter season had already been rounded up months ago.

If it comes to that (when referring to the winter league) what The Times did not say then was that for the first time Sliema ignored a long-standing gentlemen’s agreement among clubs, not to make use of foreign players in a competition intended to give youngsters more try-outs. This, Sliema did when they played the Italian Bogdan Rath in the semi-final play-offs against Neptunes, whom they beat 10-8.

Drawing a parallel with football does not hold water, as the football season lasts a good 10 months with no distinction between summer and winter competitions, not as in the case of waterpolo in Malta.

Facts are facts.

A J Cachia

St Julian’s