The National Stadium at Ta’ Qali will be the venue for the final of the 15th European Airports Football Championship which will be played in Malta between Friday and Sunday.
Apart from the Malta International Airport (MIA) team, there will be 13 other sides taking part, including current holders London City.
There will also be four teams from Germany (Frankfurt, Hannover, Munich and Munster/ Osnabruck), three from Russia (Bratsk, Moscow Domodedovo and Moscow Aeromar Sheremetyevo), two French teams (Lyon and Nice Cote d’Azur), Dublin (Ireland), Krakow (Poland) and Vienna (Austria).
Reuben Sciberras, head of the organising committee, thanked all those involved in the organisation to ensure that the 350 participants will have a wonderful experience during their stay here.
Other crucial stakeholders were the National Council for Sport, the Malta Tourism Authority as well as sponsors like Farsons plc and Catermax, he said.
The concept behind the tournament, first played in Dublin in 1984, was to organise a sport and social event for airport employees.
Apart from the rivalry and competition on the field, the tourna-ment also sought to further deve-lop stronger relations between European airports.
The tournament grew in stature and has now been held uninterruptedly every two years, starting from a modest six teams and growing to 20 (Malta 2000) and 18 (Munich 2008).
Malta International Airport first participated in 1994, in Shannon, Ireland.
Despite being the smallest airport, the MIA team succeeded in reaching the final eight in all but the Munich tournament, also making the final on two consecutive editions in 2002 and 2004.
For the past 10 years, MIA also had one of its representatives sitting on the European Airports Football Association’s board.