In the council meeting of August 9, 1983, the Malta FA announced its plans to change the formats of the Premier League and First Division.

Under the new system, the championship was divided in two stages.

In phase one, the clubs played each other once on a league basis. The first four then formed the Championship Pool and the other four played in the Relegation Pool.

The usual lobbying for points was eliminated by a new rule which permitted only the points won against the other teams in the same section to be carried over to the second phase.

This system of play, a version of which was adopted by FIFA for the 1998 World Cup qualification matches, seemed to be fool-proof on paper.

The teams could never be sure which other sides would be in their pool in phase two. Therefore, it stood to reason that they would fight for every point in phase one.

However, there were other loopholes which made the new system less than perfect.

At the end of phase one, Żurrieq and Rabat Ajax finished on equal points in fourth place. Since the match between them had ended in a 1-1 draw, a play-off was needed to sort out the issue.

Rabat won 2-0 and Żurrieq were demoted to the Relegation Pool. Since Żurrieq were the only un-beaten team during phase one, the system was highly criticised, and the next season it was scrapped.

On a personal note, however, I feel that the system was a good one and it suited our conditions well. Given time, it could have been perfected and it would have been accepted by all concerned.

Meanwhile, season 1983-84 was the one of Bulgarian players.

On August 12, 1983, the authorities and the Malta FA finally agreed on a policy to engage foreign players and the first to come here were from Bulgaria.

Ħamrun Spartans signed Georgi Ivanov from Slavia Sofia.

Ivanov had been capped 10 times by Bulgaria.

Later in the season the Reds signed Alexander Gutman, an Argentine youth international.

Floriana signed Braimir Jordan, of Kotchev, who had played seven times for Bulgaria. Hibs’ foreigner that year was Trayko Sokolov, a Bulgarian international defender.

But it was Żurrieq who made the best bargain of all when they signed George Iliev Deanov. The Bulgarian midfielder had played 250 times for Lokomotiv Sofia and scored 70 goals. He also played 18 times for his country.

Rabat also made a good signing when, in November 1983, they engaged Iordanu Filipov, an international keeper of high standard.

These foreign players put some colour into an otherwise dull Premier League season.

City claim title

At the start of the championship, Ħamrun were hot favourites to retain the league title.

However, it was Valletta, thanks to their overall consistency, who became champions for the 12th time in their history.

Led by their shrewd coach Joe Cilia, the Citizens found very little opposition in their quest for the title. Although they did not have any foreign players in their team, the Lilywhites were by far the best side in the competition.

The Valletta rearguard was as solid as a rock. In 13 games, Valletta’s defence was unbeaten on 10 occasions. On the other hand, the forward-line was good enough to score the goals required.

In phase one, Valletta, Ħamrun and Hibernians were way above the others but the Spartans were too inconsistent and lost precious points which cost them dear in the second part of the competition.

Rabat registered the best results in the first round of the Championship Pool. They beat Hibs and Ħamrun 1-0 and drew 0-0 with Valletta. This, however, was not enough to topple the Citizens from top spot in the standings.

Ħamrun only collected half the points available while Hibs did not win a single match and were eliminated from the race early on.

Valletta dominated the second round, beating the Spartans 1-0, Hibernians 2-1 and Rabat 2-0 to win the championship.

At the end of the competition, with only one match left to be played, it seemed that Ħamrun had claimed the runners-up spot and qualified for the UEFA Cup.

Rabat could still finish in second place had they beaten Valletta in the last match but no one expected the Citizens to mar their party by going down to the Magpies.

However, although City won the match, Rabat were awarded the points after a protest because of incidents during the match.

Rabat, therefore, displaced the Spartans from the runners-up spot and grabbed a place in Europe.