Hundreds of young footballers are still unsure whether they will make it to a tournament in Denmark in time for kick off on Monday after their charter flight was cancelled on Friday. 

Some 280 Maltese passengers, mostly young footballers, who were supposed to leave Malta for Denmark on Friday morning, were told not to turn up at the airport as their charter flight had been cancelled at the last minute. 

The flight had been booked through the same Air Malta employee broker who was involved in a similar incident earlier this week.

According to parents whose children were supposed to participate in the tournament, the teams are still in the dark and have been told to "wait and see". The children, the parents said, cannot understand why they will not be going to Denmark after months of training, with many of them inconsolable. 

Late on Friday, representatives of Pieta' Hotspurs, Birkirkara FC and Ħamrun Spartans football nurseries filed an official letter in court calling on the broker to honour his contractual agreement, refund parents money owed and pay up any damages. The letter was filed by lawyers Franco Debono, Amadeus Cachia and Marion Camilleri.

Times of Malta is informed the courts heard the case with urgency on Saturday morning.

Questions sent to the Tourism Ministry have yet to be answered.

The broker, Air Malta operations controller Joffrey Mallia was suspended late on Sunday evening by the airline, which said it was not aware of the charter operation until the request for assistance was received.

Mr Mallia, however, has insisted Air Malta was fully aware he had been offering the flight brokering services, so much so that the outbound flight had been booked through the national carrier.

'We do not have the fleet capacity to help' - Air Malta

Reacting in a statement, an Air Malta spokesman said the airline has been approached by the representative of the football group due to go to Denmark, with a request to operate four charter flights to the country. 

“The airline has tried its utmost to meet this latest request which would entail operating eight flights (four with passengers and four empty flights). 

“Unfortunately, Air Malta does not have the available fleet capacity to service the requests and cannot compromise its scheduled and planned flights,” the spokesman said. 

Air Malta noted that it had stepped in to help a group - many of whom were children - stranded overseas last week as a result of a similar incident.