Following their upset to Neptunes Grimaldi in the KO final last week, Sliema Frank Salt Real Estate will be eager to stay in the hunt for the National Championship with a win over San Ġiljan Allcare this weekend.

Today, Exiles Ferretti have one last chance to revive their hopes of avoiding a relegation play-off at the end of the season when taking on Sirens Ritter Sport who made sure of their place in the top flight after beating Valletta 11-10 on Tuesday.

The major attraction at the National Pool should be tomorrow’s Championship Pool match between Sliema and San Ġiljan.

The Saints, third in the top-tier league, are now definitely out of the reckoning following the midweek defeat to Neptunes (17-11).

Victory for Aleksandar Nikolic’s San Ġiljan would be almost insig-nificant at this stage but a win for Sliema means the Blues will have cut the deficit with leaders Neptunes to five points.

The top two teams in the Championship Pool are still scheduled to face each other twice before the title race is over on September 6 so that makes Sliema even more motivated to beat the Saints.

The previous two clashes bet-ween Sliema and San Ġiljan produced highly-entertaining fares with the Blues emerging victorious twice by a one-goal margin following identical 10-9 wins.

However, with the Saints now only playing for prestige and Sliema looking to maintain their title hopes, tomorrow’s fixture could lack the same competitive levels of the previous matches involving these same two teams in the championship.

For sure, Neptunes will be interested spectators knowing a Sliema failure to beat San Ġiljan would ease their path to an impressive fifth successive league title.

If that happens, the Reds can seal their success in their next match – against Sliema on Wednesday.

Meanwhile, Otters Nivea breathed new life in the First Division on Wednesday after a win over the erstwhile unbeaten Marsascala Mor€ (10-9) to halt the southerners’ stride at the top of the standings.

Otters are now joint second with Marsaxlokk Fischer on 14 points in the standings, four behind leaders Marsascala who should return to winning ways today when playing bottom-placed Ta’ Xbiex Amigos.

A more intriguing encounter is set for tomorrow as Gozo team Otters face Marsaxlokk, a match that could decide which side will challenge Marsascala for the top position and a slot in the promotion play-off.

Premier League

  P W D L F A Pts
Neptunes 11 9 2 0 161 108 29
Sliema 10 6 3 1 113 100 21
San Ġiljan 11 5 0 6 128 116 15
               
Sirens 12 6 1 5 134 135 19
Valletta 12 3 1 8 122 139 10
Exiles 12 0 3 9 101 161 3

First Division

  P W D L F A Pts
Marsascala 9 5 3 1 102 90 18
Marsaxlokk 9 4 2 3 93 87 14
Otters 9 4 2 3 96 94 14
Ta’ Xbiex 9 1 1 7 82 102 4

Programme
Today: 18.45 Marsascala vs Ta’ Xbiex. 20.00 Sirens vs Exiles.
Tomorrow: 18.15 Otters vs Marsaxlokk. 19.30 Sliema vs San Ġiljan.

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