Starting Afresh

The Club possessed a group of youngsters that were ‘blocked’ by the established of the previous year’s super team, which made a clean sweep of the honours. The exodus of these players created space for these promising youngsters like Leonard Galea, Patrick Busuttil, Stephen Muscat, Michael Paris and Andrew Mallia who had practically no experience in senior competitive waterpolo. The Committee decided to mould these lads with the loyal and seasoned players that remained to form a new squad made up of a good mix of experience and youth.

In 1978, the Amateur Swimming Association of Malta (ASA) decided to change the format of the second division league. The arguments which the Association used were that having been depleted of it best players, Exiles did not have enough talented players to field a competitive team to bridge then existing disparity in the standard between the winners of the second division and the first division teams. It was indeed a very hard pill to swallow such a decision, which the Club had to accept. The format consisted of pitting the second division teams with the reserve string of some of the first division teams. In the end the Sliema reserves proved to be too strong for the rest of the teams by winning easily all their matches in their section that included Valletta (reserves), Marsaxlokk, Rabat (later Barracudas) and Exiles.  We finished third in the table with a fine win over Valletta 5-1 which cost them the top place and a close second round loss 6-7 against the same team which paraded a youngster by the name of Kurt Dowling who scored a poker. Besides losing twice against Sliema (3-7) and (5-10) we were drawn against them in the knock–out competition and finishing the season on the losing end (3-5).

The following year (1979), Exiles organized its first training camp abroad. Rome was chosen as the venue with all the contacts being made by the then Club President Gino Camilleri. Preparations for this trip started in earnest and to cover some of the expenses involved, a souvenir programme was printed. It was the 20th June when the contingent made up of 24 persons left by air to the Eternal City. It was indeed a tremendous experience training and playing in excellent facilities and admiring the discipline shown by the Italian swimmers during training. Needless to say whilst the hundreds of children were sharing eight lanes without uttering a word, our squad made up of 15 players were jabbering and complaining about lack of adequate space in a diving pool. It was also an honour to see the name of Exiles on the notice boards of the indoor pool of the Foro Italico, which forms part of the Olimpico Sports Complex, announcing the friendly match against Lazio Nuoto. This match was a curtain raiser for a league match of a regional league to which a good number of spectators turned up. The trip will be long remembered for fifteen-year old Michael Paris scorer of 5 goals in our last and only match won on the tour, as well as the emergence of his younger brother John, a future star on the local waterpolo scene.

The intensity of the training and the number of matches played during the pre-season trip was reflected in the first outing of the league when we lost the game 1-2 to Marsascala in a format that was identical to the previous one. The team made amends to an oscillating league campaign when they lifted the knock-out competition (its third win in five seasons) by beating Rabat (9-7), Marsaxlokk (5-3) and Sirens in the Final (5-1) in front of a bumper crowd at B’Bugia pitch before the Final of the first division.

In 1980, Exiles repeated the pre-season trip by visiting nearby Syracuse in Sicily. As the Cittadella dello Sport is a swimming complex, which is used practically round the clock, one had to apply earlier to the Council of Syracuse to obtain permission to make use of the swimming pool. Arrangements were normally made through contacts with Sandro Campagna a former world class player who only left Ortigia (the club which launched him) at the end of his brilliant career.

On the local scene, the experiment of mixing the second division teams with the reserve teams of the first division clubs proved to be not popular and the format went back to the old one with the second division teams vying for the top position and promotion. Exiles and Marsaxlokk ended their commitments on an equal level of 14 points with seven wins and one defeat recorded against each other. Incidents had occurred in the second match when Exiles edged their closest opponents 5-4 to force a decider. The incidents, which were allegedly provoked by the contributor of this article, landed Marsaxlokk into trouble for the havoc, which they caused after the match. They were in fact penalized by having four points deducted from their final tally of points to crown Exiles as champions. The Knock-Out competition saw Exiles win easily against Sirens (11-4) and Rabat (6-1) before meeting again Marsxlokk in the final, which the latter won 7-6 in a hard-fought match. This somewhat made some amends for the harsh disciplinary decision taken against Marsaxlokk. Exiles were on the other hand punished excessively on the day by the control of the men in white.

The success in such a short time propelled the Committee to make a gallant effort to take the bold step of competing in the local top sphere of waterpolo, a dream that had been pursued since the inception of the club a few years earlier.

In the next article we will see how tough 1981 was for the Club.

Did you know that…

Next season (2006), foreign players will be allowed to participate once again in the domestic leagues. There are already rumours that the top clubs are fetching the services of the best waterpolo players.

Exiles managed to sign a few good names in the past and these included Jeremy Birmingham a Briton who was the first foreigner to be signed when the doors were opened in 1983. Wilco Mondeel a Dutchman followed in 1984, Sergei Lissitsyn a Russian played for Exiles in 1993 and Marco Booij was included in a very young and experimental side in 1994. In 1995 it was the turn of another Dutchman Jan de Vries to help the team whilst in 1996 Exiles had the honour of signing one of the best foreign players (in and out of the water) ever to play in Malta; Revaz Tchomakidze a Georgian who still plays for the Russian national waterpolo team and has won both World and Olympic medals.