St George's win again

St. George's 1
Pietà Hotspurs 0

A Benoir Fenech goal, 13 minutes from time, gave St George's a second consecutive victory. After a poor start, the saints are floating in safer waters in the league standings.

After beating Mqabba in their previous match, Pietà took a step backwards and are now one position off the bottom, just ahead of lowly San Ġwann.

A draw, perhaps, would have been a fair outcome to this match as both sides had their chances. But, in the end, the Saints took theirs well and could have easily increased their lead before the final whistle as the Hotspurs pushed more men forward in search of an equaliser.

Silvio Sciberras and Chris Ciappara were mainly behind the Saints' victory even though the winning goal came courtesy of a defender. Anthony Ewurun gave the Hotspurs a torrid time as he created space for himself and his colleagues with a series of dashing runs.

On 20 minutes, Ewurun beat the Pietà goalkeeper but his shot flashed against the side-netting. Three minutes later, he again hit wide after receiving an inviting ball from Josef Dalli.

The Hotspurs' first real threat on the St George's goal came on the half-hour when Sheldon Grech released Quilin Refalo but the latter's first-time effort, from just inside the box, went inches wide.

At this stage, Pietà were showing the brighter ideas and just before the break Carl Sammut beat the challenge of two defenders but his following shot was cleared off the line by Emmanuel Sevasta.

Pietà started the second half on the attack. Refalo and Spiteri combined perfectly outside the opponents' box but the Saints custodian was on the right spot to deny Spiteri.

But, on 77 minutes, St George's scored the goal that mattered when from an inswinging Sciberras corner, Fenech's thundering header hit the back of the net with Miguel Montfort beaten.

The Pietà keeper came to his side's rescue two minutes later when he stopped a Sciberras curler. The Hotspurs threw caution to the wind and the Saints could have wrapped up the match late on but Sciberras, put through by Ewurun, hit badly from an ideal scoring position.

St. George's: T. Galea, A. Bonello, C. Grech (S. Sciberras), E. Sevasta, N. Caruana (J. Bugeja), A. Ewurun, E. Amaira, B. Fenech, J. Dalli (C. Ciappara), G. Mallia, G. Bonello.

Pietà: M. Montfort, C. Sammut, C. Spiteri, B. Sciberras, Q. Refalo, S. Grech, C. Cassar, I. Grech (R. Refalo), J. Azzopardi (J. Delia), S. Micallef, S. Pace.

Referee: Adrian Azzopardi.

Man of the match: Anthony Ewurun (St George's).