Michael Debono, Joe Saragozza and Leonard Callus finished their Day One commitments at the Commonwealth Games with one victory in the bag from two matches as the opening qualifiers from the men’s triples got underway yesterday.
The Malta trio, based in Australia, combined perfectly in the first match against Scotland at the Jawaharlal Nehru Sports Complex to win 1.5-0.5 after set scores of 6-5 and 6-6 in their favour.
The second match, played later in the afternoon, was against Canada. The score was one-set all (10-9, 6-10) but Canada won the tiebreak 6-0. The latter were surprisingly beaten by Namibia earlier in the day after another tiebreak which the Africans won 5-0.
Malta was drawn in Pool A in the triples event along with nine other teams. Today, Debono, Saragozza and Callus play two other qualifiers, against New Zealand and Australia, both ranked among the favourites to win this tournament.
Brendan Aquilina and Francis Michael Vella, who also reside in Australia, are flying the Maltese flag in the men’s pairs tournament.
In their first match yesterday, they trounced the Falkland Islands 2-0 (10-4, 24-1).
Today, Aquilina and Vella play their next Pool B matches against Samoa and Namibia.
Hindle Deguara out
Another member from Team Malta in action yesterday was squash player Bradley Hindle Deguara.
At the Siri Fort Sports Complex, he could not have hoped for a better start after eliminating Navin Samarasinghe, of Sri Lanka, in a first round match that lasted 23 minutes.
Hindle Deguara beat his opponent in straight sets – 11-1, 11-5, 11-3.
Unfortunately, he was then ousted from the tournament when later in the day he got beaten 3-1 by no.14 seed, Ryan Cuskelly.
Cuskelly, of Australia, won the second round match 11-8, 11-8, 6-11, 11-6. This tie finished in controversy, however, as Hindle Deguara complained of bad sportsmanship from his rival who obstructed his way consistently.
Malta chef-de-mission Julian Pace Bonello told The Times that on one occasion during the match, Hindle Deguara fell badly after colliding with Cuskelly and suffered a leg injury.
The Maltese Olympic Committee (MOC) immediately launched a formal protest against the result of the second round match. The tournament officials, Pace Bonello said, were due to de-cide on the issue in a hear-ing before matches from the third round get underway today.
Aside from the protest, Pace Bonello said he is hopeful Hindle Deguara will regain his full fitness in time for the doubles event which starts on Friday.
Hindle Deguara will be partnered by Michael Fiteni.