Take it to the hole!

My friend Cikku was chewing at the end of his pencil. He scowled, humphed and returned to gnawing the thin piece of wood. All of a sudden his eyes lit up and with an abrupt rush of energy drew a circle on the thin book in front of him. He then returned to his pensive mode, screwed up his eyes and started to nibble...

After three more unexpected bursts of energy he stood up exclaiming that he had finally managed to spot the difference in the two drawings before him. Puzzles, for Cikku, are more than a necessary part of life!

Spot the difference

Below are the results of this year's Promotion Cup for Men held in Malta as well as the results of the previous edition.

2002 - San Marino vs Malta 81-68; Malta vs Albania 60-87; Malta vs Scotland 74-96; Malta vs Moldova 44-76; Malta vs Gibraltar 81-68.

2000 - Malta vs Andorra 65-90; San Marino vs Malta 74-55; Malta vs Scotland 61-71; Gibraltar vs Malta 67-83; Malta vs Wales 74-66.

A quick look at these results shows that Malta's performance has remained rather unchanged which means that while we have not fallen any further behind certain nations we have certainly not caught up.

What was certainly obvious from watching the games was, however, that the team seemed to be extremely fragile from a psychological point-of-view.

Invariably (well except the Gibraltar game of course) the team would begin to make a comeback only for an unforced error to be turned into an avalanche of points by the opposition.

Perhaps the most disappointing performance of the tournament was that against Moldova when the team just failed to find any rhythm in the second half. What I found even more perplexing was that in games when we were trailing by around ten points in the fourth quarter we failed to put pressure our opponents on the full court.

There is no doubt that the lack of height this year did not help, however, having a smaller team should mean having a faster team. Unfortunately, this was far from the truth.

I would like to see a far more aggressive style of play in the future, but then again I am not the coach! Best performance of the tournament was that against Scotland who dwarfed the Maltese team, while the most positive aspect of the tournament was the impressive debut of Addison Bonnici who played solid basketball throughout the tournament despite being only 17.

Spot the difference (2)

2002 - Albania vs Malta 100-50; Malta vs Iceland 49-75; Gibraltar vs Malta 57-85; Andorra vs Malta 65-57.

2000 - Malta vs Macedonia 20-83; Andorra vs Malta 64-59; Scotland vs Malta 93-41; Malta vs Gibraltar 75-52.

It is hard to criticise a team from just the results obtained and the official statistics, but a quick look at the results of last the two editions of the Promotion Cup for women shows that once again Malta's performances have remained on a par to those of two years ago.

It must be said that coach Carlo Farrugia was graced with a team far superior in height (relatively) than the men's team coached by Joe Galea.

It appears that our women were more aggressive with the ball than our men since the men attempted 97 foul shots in five games while the women shot 99 in only four games. Unfortunately the performance of both teams at the foul line left much to be desired.

The men shot a dismal 57.7 per cent while the women managed to upstage them in the futility department by nailing 47.5 per cent. Something needs to be done about this!

Dorianne Galea only managed 41.9 per cent in her 43 trips to the foul line. It is a pity since Galea's statistics are otherwise impressive. Galea was, in fact top scorer of the tournament and one of the top rebounders despite not being a forward.

This once again goes to emphasise why Galea is undoubtedly the best player on the island at the moment. It is hardly surprising that when she moved to Depiro, they managed to finally oust Hibs as champions!

More Promotion

At the moment the Cadets and Cadettes National Teams are competing in the Promotion Cup of their respective categories. The girls are playing in Malta and have played two games. The first was against Scotland in which they lost 31-54.

The game was actually much closer than the result suggests and on the whole was a positive debut for our girls. The second game against Luxembourg seemed to be another positive performance until the team crumbled in the second half losing 65-30.

They still have three more games to play with good opportunities to win against Andorra and moreover Gibraltar. The game against Iceland will not be so easy.

The boys are currently playing in Cyprus. It appears they have found the going extremely tough against Cyprus, losing 23-117, but did improve in their second encounter against Scotland (60-84). Hopefully next week I will be able to give you a complete update on all the action.

An appeal

Yes, it is hot. Yes Ta' Qali may be an inferno at this time of the year, however, if you have the time why not give the local girls some support, you are not too late, as Malta faces Iceland today and Gibraltar tomorrow. See you there.