Birkirkara and Ħamrun Spartans will look for a morale-booster ahead of this week’s league fixtures when playing in the Malta Christmas Cup at the Hibs Stadium this afternoon along with visiting Italian team Padova.
The triangular tournament, now in its second edition, will certainly offer a good opportunity for the two Maltese clubs to sharpen their fitness after almost three weeks of inactivity due to the Christmas festivities.
Added to that is the incentive of facing Padova, the second club from Serie B this Yuletide to visit the islands after Triestina who played in the Capodanno Cup last week.
This season, Padova are marking their centenary celebrations and want to mark the occasion with letters of gold by winning promotion to the Serie A.
Paul Zammit, the Birkirkara coach, said the Christmas Cup comes at a ‘delicate stage’ of the season.
“This is a very delicate stage for us as the players have not played a league match for almost three weeks now,” Zammit told reporters at the launching of the tournament in midweek.
“The team continued to train hard in the past weeks but the players can only regain their intensity in the game by playing matches of this type. Indeed, the tournament will be a good opportunity to step preparations for the second half of the season.”
Joe Fenech, who represented Ħamrun at the launching, echoed Zammit’s thoughts on the tournament.
He said: “We are very grateful to JPL Sports Events for inviting us to play in this tournament. For our coach and players this will be good practise ahead of our next Premier League match against Floriana. Besides, the tournament will also help the team to sharpen its fitness ahead of a very difficult run-in for a Championship Pool berth.”
All three teams in the tournament are set to make use of all their personnel today but no new players are likely to be paraded at the Hibs Stadium with football clubs across the continent now engaged in negotiations in the second transfer window of the season.
Zammit said Birkirkara, the Malta champions, will be cautious before targeting any reinforcements this month while Fenech declared that his club will not be adding any new players to Steve D’Amato’s squad.
For Padova, the tournament will be their final outing before the next Serie B fixture next Saturday when they host fellow promotion seekers Torino at the Stadio Euganeo.
“This short break in Malta has been of huge benefit for us,” Padova coach Alessandro Calori said.
“We had ample time during this break to discuss certain matters on how to lift our game ahead of what promises to be a tough second part of the season. We start with a difficult home match against Torino. If we win that one we will put ourselves in a good position in the promotion race.
“Our objective this season is to finish as high as possible in the league and we will do our best to celebrate Padova’s 100th anniversary. But to achieve that we need to work more as a team and the Malta Christmas Cup will be a good medium to reach our goal.”
Programme
Hibs Stadium: 15.00 Ħamrun Spartans vs Birkirkara; 16.00 losers match 1 vs Padova; 17.00 winners match 1 vs Padova.