San Giljan Salini 11
Neptunes Grimaldi 17
(1-6), (2-2), (3-5), (5-4)
Neptunes Grimaldi sealed a memorable league campaign with an easy win against San Ġiljan Salini Resort, as they were crowned champions for the 24th time in history, capturing also the sixth league in seven years.
At the beginning of the season almost everyone excluded Neptunes out of the title race with San Ġiljan and Sliema looking more as favourites.
But as the season went along, Neptunes were continuing to turn into a force despite a very limited squad.
But a technical team masterminded by new coach from Montenegro Zoran Maslovar and assisted by Igor Martinovic, solved the problem as they prepared the team both physically and tactically and using only 8 players in most of their games. Amongst the regular players, Jeremy Abela and Miguel Zammit emerged as new talents in the Neptunes squad.
Neptunes stepped up their game from the beginning and after Vapenski opened the score, they responded with a goal from Niki Lanzon, Miguel Zammit and a poker by Jordan Camilleri.
Maslovar’s team continued to dominate play as San Ġiljan were powerless in their efforts to reduce the margin.
Neptunes continued to score more goals from individual players and controlled the last part of the game to win comfortably 17-11.
After the match, the Executive Head of BOV Paul Gauci and the vice-President of the ASA Karl Galea presented the trophy to the captain Niki Lanzon.
San Giljan: J. Sammut, P. Borg, A. Galea, B. Vapenski (7), Ma. Zammit (1), K. Galea (1), C. Mercieca, B. Plumpton (1), Da. Zammit, L. Saliba, Di. Zammit (1), D. Camilleri
Neptunes: A. Borg Cole, N. Lanzon (3), C. Radu (2), M. Cutajar, T. Agius, M. Lanzon, S. Camilleri (4), J. Camilleri (5), J. Abela (1), M. Zammit (1), B. Lanzon (1), M. Azzopardi, M. Castillo
Referees: Peter Balzan, Filippo Gomez
Photos: James Bianchi