Organisers asked to scrap play-off

The Cypriot Tennis Federation is mulling a move to scrap play-offs for third place and instead award a bronze medal to both losing semi-finalists as was the norm in previous GSSEs.

During a technical meeting yesterday, the Malta delegation, led by chef-de-mission Vince Scicluna, asked the host country to consider the proposal to avoid a backlog of matches.

"Before Monaco 2007 no bronze medal play-offs were played in both singles and doubles," Scicluna told The Times.

"The losing semi-finals were classified in third place and we feel that this should be the case here.

"Our suggestion has the backing of other countries and hopefully the Cypriot federation will accept the proposal."

Meanwhile, in men's singles, starting today, Matthew Asciak and Daniel Ceross were handed tough-looking draws yesterday.

Asciak was pitted against Arnar Sigurdsson, the Icelandic player who beat the Malta champion in the second round two years ago. If Asciak advances he could meet Jean-Rene Lisnard, the gold medallist in the 2007 Games for Monaco.

Ceross faces Monaco's Benjamin Balleret in the first round. Balleret is the losing finalist in the Monaco.

Kim Cassar and Elaine Genovese will also get their singles event going.

Genovese was awarded a bye to the second round while Cassar will take on home favourite Daniella Kyprianidou today.

The finals in singles are scheduled for Saturday afternoon. The doubles tournament starts tomorrow.