Floriana-Naxxar 1-0
Floriana: D. Hanford, A. Scicluna, I. Edet, S. Pisani (L. Casha), C. Caruana, I. Coronado, D. Pinheiro (G. Favero), C. Borg, J. Borg, G. Muir, S. Borg.
Naxxar L. J. Azzopardi, V. Bellia, D. Bonnici (M. Briffa), A. Buhagiar, RG Cassar, G. Da Silva Ribeiro, P. Doffo, D. Falzon, T. Lopez de Souza, A. Rocha da Silva, O. Zongo.
Referee: F. Zammit.
Asst refs: E. Spiteri, S. Attard.
4th official: P. Caruana.
Scorer: D. Pinheiro
Yellow cards: R. da Silva, T. Lopez de Souza,
Player of the match: V. Bellia
TMI Top 3: 1. I. Coronado; 2. V. Bellia; 3. D. Hanford.
Attendance: 719
A late first half strike – an unfortunate Doffo deviation on a shot by Pinheiro – was enough for Floriana to beat a spirited Naxxar side yesterday.
The victory lifted Floriana – who started the season on minus six points – on the 12-point mark along with Tarxien, two points adrift of the same Naxxar, who remain in sixth place.
Floriana had Daniel Bogdanovic and Gary Roberts missing – they have both left the club recently. On their part, Naxxar had Evaldo, Del Negro and Decesare suspended while the injured L. Cutajar and Terence Scerri were obviously ruled out.
The first half was disappointing as neither team seemed to be in command even if Floriana appeared to be technically superior to the Lions.
The Greens, perhaps, were slightly better than their opponents and even saw little more of the ball. For this reason, they deserved to be ahead even if their goal had the element of luck written all around it – a very unfortunate deviation.
Naxxar did what was expected of them – they made life hard for Floriana and even had their own good moments, but they never really troubled the Greens goalie Hanford who was only in action on a couple of central shots which he saved without any trouble at all.
In the second half, after a furious start by Floriana, Naxxar came back strongly into the match but they missed their best chance and all the points as they never really created another good scoring opportunity from then on, despite their accent on attack.
After a quiet opening in which both sides sized each other up, Floriana created the first action worthy of note when from a Christian Caruana cornerkick, Steve Pisani saw his first time shot going just wide.
Naxxar replied with a Lopez de Sousa cross being intercepted by Hanford before Bonnici could connect.
In another attack, Naxxar threatened through Daren Falzon, but his shot was central and thus easily saved by Hanford.
Floriana took the lead on the 41st minute when a Diogo Pinheiro shot was unluckily deviated by Pablo Doffo past his own goalie Azzopardi.
Moments later, it was the technically-gifted Coronado who went round his direct opponent and sent in a beautiful pass to Caruana who saw his shot being blocked by Azzopardi.
At the start of the second half, it was all Floriana until the 53rd minute when Bellia set Da Silva Ribeiro, but with Hanford rushing out of his charge, the Brazilian striker lifted the ball over the bar.
On the hour, Floriana had a freekick by Muir ending over the bar but in the 67th minute, Hanford had to rush out of his charge to clear in extremis before Daren Falzon could hit at goal.
Hanford was again the protagonist in the 69th when he turned to corner in style a Falzon freekick.
From then on, Naxxar tried hard to score an equaliser but Floriana defended so well that goalie Hanford was never really tested again before the final whistle.
For the Greens, it was another step towards a place in the Top Six for the second phase of the championship.