William Chetcuti and Brian Galea are well in contention for a place in Thursday’s trap final after the opening day of qualification at the Budva Shooting Ranges.

The participating shooters had to contend with a nervous wait before starting proceedings as visibility in the shooting ranges was scarce due to a thick cloud of fog that covered the venues.

After almost two hours of wait, the first round was held and here Chetcuti made his intention clear with a clinical display hitting a straight before adding 22 and 24 to finish with 71 from 75 clays.

That left Chetcuti in second place, just one adrift of Montenegro’s shooter Ivo Stanisic who compiled identical scores of 24 to end with 71.

The remaining four berths in the top six were filled by Daniel Dandreis, of Luxembourg, Cypriot duo Nikolas Kyriakou and Andreas Makri, and surprise entrant Alessandra Perilli, of San Marino.

Perilli, the San Marino top female shooter, was not expected to compete in the men’s event. However, the organisers decision to scrap the female trap event forced the Mediterranean Games gold medallist to make a request to the organisers to be included in the men’s field where also includes her husband Gian Marco Berti.

Galea, on the other hand, had a tough start to the competition when hitting 21 and 22 but recovered in the final round when compiling 24 to finish the day in eighth place on 67, three adrift of sixth place.

The trap event continues today with the final two qualifying rounds which will define the six shooters to contest the final in the afternoon.

Team Malta’s participation in the table tennis team competition ended in the group stage as both the men’s and women’s selection failed to make it to the semi-finals.

The women’s trio of Viktoria Luchenkova, Anthea Cutajar and Sasha Genovese faced a must-win scenario against the Monegasque team who had in their ranks Chinese player Xiaoxin Jang who is ranked 66th in the ITTF world rankings.

The opening two rubbers were shared as Luchenkova beat Ulrika Quist 3-2 while Jang had the better of Cutajar 2-0.

In the doubles, Quist and Jang overcame the Maltese pair 3-0 to hand their team a 2-1 lead.

Luchenkova needed to beat Jang to send the tie into a decider but failed to build on a bright start, when winning the first set, as she suffered a 3-1 defeat as Monaco advanced to the semis.

The men’s team, formed by Andrew Gambina, Daniel Bajada, Gabriel Grixti, had already been knocked out of the competition after suffering two back-to-back defeats on the opening day of the tournament.

Yesterday, they completed their commitments with a 3-0 defeat to Luxembourg.

In beach volley, Melissa Sue Cheviron and Dominika Dworniczak finally picked up their first win at the GSSE when they beat Luxembourg 2-0.

It was a much-needed boost for the Maltese pair who suffered frustrating defeats on the opening day to Monaco and Liechtenstein, despite their battling showings. Today they face hosts Montenegro.

Yesterday, Cheviron and Dworniczak played a solid match to win both sets against Luxembourg duo Dajana Volz and Marie Reiterova 21-19 and 21-17. The Maltese team will be up against Montenegro today.

In the men’s tournament, Roberto Balzan and Manuel Raffa lost their match against Luxembourg duo Matthias Cloot and Petko Tunchev 2-0 (21-15, 21-12).

Today, Balzan and Raffa take on Monaco.

The first matches from the tennis competitions were finally played yesterday in Budva with Matthew Asciak and Elaine Genovese both booking their place into the quarter-finals of their respective singles competitions.

Genovese broke little sweat to overcome Cypriot Maria Siopacha 6-3 6-2.

In the quarter-final, Genovese will be up against the winner of the match between Danae Petroula and Anna Soffia Gronholm.

Asciak is also through to the last eight when he eased past Pablo Ricardo Rodeiro, of Andorra, 6-3 6-2 to set up a last eight clash against Marco De Rossi, of San Marino.