The opening matches of the BOV National League resulted in strolling victories for San Ġiljan Tropicana and Sliema McDonald's over Marsaxlokk Freeport and Marsascala Ocean and Sky respectively.

In the first encounter, the Saints asserted their superiority over their opponents as they proved to be the faster and fitter outfit, with their more accurate shooting being their main weapon. Goals were not frequent in the coming but they arrived at regular intervals.

Rado Gosdodilov and Vladimir Kritkovic were the two foreigners making their debut for San Ġiljan, while the southseasiders did not parade any overseas players.

All in all it was an easy outing for San Ġiljan, coached by John Caruana. Matthew Zammit was again the top scorer with five goals.

Marsaxlokk, guided from the bench by the Saints' ex-player Ian Azzopardi, just did not have it in them to offer any challenge.

Sliema were equally at ease in disposing of Marsascala, with their forceful play and superior skills pinning down their opponents.

The Blues' two overseas players, Raymond Fodor and Robert Kovacs, displayed some of the skills expected from players of high quality. Needless to say, they added to Sliema's strenght.

It was a no contest from the word 'go' despite Marsascala scoring a momentary equaliser after the Blues netted an early goal.

Sliema surged forward and hammered their opponents, for whom Chris Sladden was directing operations from their bench.

The stamp of a no-contest was maintained throughout and that made for monotonous proceedings, despite the Blues' option to parade all their manjack at one time or another.

For statistical purposes, their top scorer was Robert Kovacs.

On Marsascala's part the only positive element was that they never resorted to playing for time. Otherwise, they had a totally negative man-up record out of several occasions.