FLORIANA 5

Furtado 33 pen., 36

Reid 48, El Hasni 55

Rovas 70

GUDJA UNITED 1

Friggieri 26

FLORIANA

G.Kitanov, O. El Hasni, K. Reid, M. Nogureira (66 C. Rovas), D. Vella, O. Spiteri (73 G. Yameogo), M. Garcia (73 J. Grech), C. Zammit Lonardelli, M. Valadsko ( 66 A. Garzia), A. Kouro (29 J. Arias) L. Furtado.

GUDJA UNITED

J. Pisani, M. Bremmer, S. Attard (61 M. Conti), M, Muchardi, L. Gatt (61 W. Serrano), R. Nanitelamio, Z. Grech, A. Friggieri (77 E. Gentile), M. Esposito, G. Joseph, G. Zammit (61 I. Salis)

Referee: Ezekiel Barbara.

Floriana threw the title race wide open yesterday when they took advantage of Ħamrun Spartans’ second consecutive half slip-up and overcome Gudja United. 

Suggestions that the Premier League race had became a procession for Ħarmun Spartans were completely dismissed yesterday as Floriana beat Gudja 5-1 to cut the gap with Ħamrun to just one point.

The Greens fell behind to an early Aidan Friggieri strike but hit back quickly through a quick-fire double by Luis Furtado and from then on they never looked back.  

As expected Floriana applied the early pressure, forcing a succession of early set pieces, with James Pisani, the Gudja goalkeeper, producing a smart save on Carlo Zammit Lonardelli after 19 minutes.

But as the Greens appeared to be gathering momentum, Gudja took a surprise lead when Friggieri scored an audacious goal from almost the halfway line after seeing Floriana goalkeeper Georgi Kitanov off his line.

Nevertheless, Floriana continued to put Gudja on the backfoot.

Mauro Camoranesi brought on Josè Arias in lieu of Alexandros Kouro with the Greens switching from a back three to back four, in a bid to strengthen the midfield against a team that was putting 10 men behind the ball.

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