Camilleri joint second in Serie A scorers’ list

Steve Camilleri, the new recipient of the 2011 waterpolo player of the year award, has continued where he left off in Malta last season.

Playing in his fourth consecutive year for RN Bogliasco, the Serie A1 side currently lying seventh in the 12-team league, the Neptunes stalwart is again topping his team’s scoring charts after day seven of the Italian top division, which has now reached almost a third of the season’s programme.

More prestigious is the fact that Camilleri’s three goals in Bogliasco’s 14-9 win against Civitavecchia on Saturday, after the nap-hand he had scored the previous Tuesday against Brescia in the 17-10 defeat for his team, lifted him to joint-second in the overall scorers’ list with 20 goals. He is two behind Valerio Rizzo, of leaders RN Savona, and equal with Valentino Gallo, of CN Posillipo.

Also of note is his 3.33 goals-per-match reading out of six matches for his team from Genova, after having missed Bogliasco’s first match because of international duty. These figures put the Maltese 24-year-old top of the average rankings.

Camilleri has twice finished as the leading scorer for Bogliasco in the previous three seasons. Presently, he is ahead of his team-mates, Arnaldo Deserti, an Italian international player, who has scored 16 goals, and German Heiko Nossek, 14.

The Malta international, who helped Neptunes complete a league and cup double this year, hit no fewer than 97 goals for the Reds throughout the local season.

He also scored a hat-trick in each of Malta’s matches against Turkey (8-7) and Poland (5-5) in the Euro preliminary group matches and then against Germany in the two matches of the final qualification round valid for the 2012 European Championships. This made it a staggering total of 109 goals.