retired_marcias

Wow...good stuff! Must be the first time San Marino have scored 4 in a match

Now all you need to do is tighten up the defence and you'll be at Euro 2008 easily

retired_loubou

This is a great story Daz :thup:

San marino is celebrating like they won the World Cup now I think, after you scored four goals in one game

enjikari

*Cheers glamdring and bjorn*

Malta vs. San Marino - World Cup Qualifying European Section Group 3
Ta' Qali, Rabat

Malta - 4-4-2
<pre class="ip-ubbcode-code-pre"> J. Fenech M. Gatt ^ ^ | | | | | |J. Buttigieg K. Farrugia D. Galea K. Scerri Subs: D. Bonnici M. Schembri C. Bonello M. Mizzi K. Borg J. AttardM. Farrugia S. Falzan M. Debattista J. Farrugia M. Abela J. Debono</pre>

San Marino - 4-1-3-2
<pre class="ip-ubbcode-code-pre"> D. Conti A.Selva ^ ^ ^ | | | | | | | | | | | | Subs: N. Chiaruzzi R. Moroni S. Celli A. Raschi F. Gasperoni D. Selva E. Gerini M. Marani A. Francioni F. Pelliccioni M. ManciniA. Della Valle P. Cupi A. Gasperoni E. Gerini N.Giardi</pre>

enjikari

*Without trying to give to much away, after our performance against Norway, you have no idea how disappointing it was to watch this match or to write the match report*

----

When the qualifying group was drawn, both our fans and the fans of the Maltese national team will have noted this one down as one of two they would have a chance of winning, with the other being the return fixture. Indeed we had won the meeting, but this time Malta were favourites due to being at home.

I wanted us to get a good start, first of all to quieten the fans, and also to knock some of the confidence out of the home side. We didn't manage to get a good start however, in-fact, we managed to get off to the worst start imaginable. Fenech somehow managed to get in behind our defence in just the second minute, a major lapse of concentration on our part. He wasted no time in smashing the ball into the top corner of the net, giving the Maltese side a very early lead.

Raffaele Moroni, our captain, decided to take it upon himself to get us back into the match with a superb run, going past four players, to get to the box. He beat one more man to send him one-on-one with the keeper but he scuffed his shot horribly wide of the goal. Michael Gatt hit an effort wide of the goal to try and extend Malta's lead before Conti tried to get us back in the game, but his shot missed by a mile.

We then lost Conti to injury, bringing on Marani in his place, and we were getting no breaks at all in the game. This was proved when Malta went two goals up in injury time of the first half, injury time that was there because one of our players had to leave the pitch. Marani's first action of the game was to get booked and to concede a free kick, in almost exactly the same position from where Moroni had scored against Norway. Unfortunately Kevin Scerri did exactly what Moroni had done, and curled the ball brilliantly into the back of the net.

I told the players to go all out at half time, to go 'gung-ho' to get something from the game, and we immediately put the home side under pressure. Selva set up Marani who had a header saved well by Debono before we managed to pull one goal back to get in the game. Marani picked up a throw-in from Della Valle and crossed to the far post from the left. Marani's cross was scuffed slightly and is bounced off the top of the post to Andy Selva, who scored one of the easiest goals he will ever score.

This was the lucky break that we had needed, to pull ourselves back in the game, but were not to have any more luck at all. Apart from bad luck, two major slices of bad luck. The first was to come straight away when Alex Gasperoni was sent off, for his second yellow card, rather controversially. I took off Francioni to bring on another defender in Selva, but I told the players they should still go for it. That was a mistake on my part. Gatt scored from the free-kick that had come from the sending off to make it three-one.

The defence started to fall to pieces and none of our players could seem to string any passes together. Giardi took a goal kick straight to Michael Gatt and he picked out Fenech with a superb pass. Fenech found himself through on goal, behind a seemingly non-existent defence, and he hit a fierce shot into the back of the net for his second of the game.

Our second slice of bad luck was to come in the final minute of the game. I had made all three substitutions and we were down to ten men when Della Valle picked up an injury that meant he couldn't continue. This meant we were down to nine men, with just three defenders - one of who had been brought off the bench. Credit to Malta however, they took full advantage of our major disadvantage. First Kevin Scerri got his second goal of the game when he hit fierce shot into the back of the net after a wonderful team move. Secondly, Scerri played Michael Farrugia through on goal, as there was plenty of space and Farrugia volleyed home the second injury time goal to give Malta a six-one win.

We had been extremely unlucky in both of our last two matches, although the result for this one probably didn't show it. We had conceded four injury time goals in the last two matches, but we had started to score on a regular basis. You have to take some sort of positive after defeats such as these.

enjikari

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>
San Marino Suffer Heavy Loss

14.9.05

Malta 6-1 San Marino (World Cup Quals (EUR) Grp 3)

In a surprisingly one-sided encounter, Malta defeated San Marino by six goals to one.

San Marino were unlucky, having only nine men at one point, but goals from Joseph Fenech (2, 72), Kevin Scerri (45, 90), Michael Gatt (66) and Michael Farrugia (90) gave the scoreline a decidely one-sided look with Andy Selva (54) replying for San Marino. Alex Gasperoni was dismissed in the 63rd minute.

The match was especially notable for the lack of fight shown by San Marino after they fell three-one behind, as they had expected to be the equal of their opponents. There is just one qualifying game left at home to Slovakia to leave an impression on the final group standings.

<HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

<pre class="ip-ubbcode-code-pre">|No. | Name | |Rat|Gls||No. | Name | |Rat|Gls||-----------------------------------------------||-----------------------------------------------|| 1 | Joseph Debono | | 8 | || 1 | Nicola Giardi | | 3 | || 2 | Jeffrey Farrugia | | 8 | || 2 | Fabio Bollini | | 5 | || 3 | Michael Farrugia | | 9 | 1 || 3 | Alessandro Della Valle |(inj 83)| 6 | || 4 | Michael Debattista | | 7 | || 4 | Alex Gasperoni(Bkd x 2)|(off 63)| 5 | || 5 | Stephen Falzan | | 7 | || 5 | Paolo Cupi (Bkd) | | 5 | || 6 |* KEVIN SCERRI (C) | |10 | 2 || 6 | Alessandro Francioni |(sub 64)| 7 | || 7 | Johnathon Buttigieg | | 8 | || 7 | Raffaele Moroni (C) | | 6 | || 8 | David Galea |(sub 85)| 7 | || 8 | Simone Celli | | 4 | || 9 | Kevin Farrugia |(sub 72)| 7 | || 9 | Nicola Chiaruzzi |(sub 45)| 5 | ||10 | Michael Gatt | | 8 | 1 ||10 | Daniele Conti |(inj 37)| 7 | ||11 | Joseph Fenech |(sub 72)| 8 | 2 ||11 | Andy Selva | | 6 | 1 ||-----------------------------------------------||-----------------------------------------------||12 | David Bonnici | | | ||12 | Andrea Raschi | | | ||14 | Michael Schembri | | | ||14 | Federico Gasperoni | | | ||15 | Charles Bonello | (on 60)| 7 | ||15 | Davide Selva | (on 64)| 5 | ||16 | Mark Mizzi | (on 60)| 7 | ||16 | Elia Gerini | | | ||17 | Kevin Borg | | | ||17 | Manuel Marani (Bkd) | (on 37)| 6 | ||18 | Joe Attard | | | ||18 | Fabrizio Pelliccioni | (on 45)| 5 | ||19 | Michael Abela | (on 85)| 7 | ||19 | Michele Mancini | | | |</pre>

enjikari

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>
Squad Announced For Final Game

6.10.05

Three changes have been forced upon San Marino as they head into their last game of qualifying at home to Slovakia.

Alex Gasperoni is suspended for one international game after his sending off against Malta and Michele Giacobbi and Manuel Marani are both injured. Their replecaments in the squad are Marco Gasperoni, Davide Casali and Davide Biordi. All of those players are uncapped but Gasperoni has been in the squad before and Biordi has two goals in four appearances with the San Marinese U-21 setup.

Coming off the highly disappointing defeat at Malta, San Marino will be looking to put that out of their minds with a good performance in their final game of qualifying to give them so hope for the future..

The squad is listed in full below. Numbers show caps/goals <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

<pre class="ip-ubbcode-code-pre">M. Bollini - GK - 0/0 F. Gasperoni - GK - 24/0N. Giardi - GK - 10/0 M. Mancini - SW/D/DM C - 0/0 F. Bollini - D R - 8/0 R. Gasperoni - D RC - 0/0E. Gerini - D RC - 2/0 P. Cupi - D LC - 8/0A. Della Valle - D LC - 11/0 D. Casali - D C - 0/0D. Selva - D C - 5/0 A. Francioni - DM C - 10/0A. Raschi - DM C - 0/0 N. Chiaruzzi - M LC - 10/0R. Gasperoni - M L - 0/0 S. Celli - M C - 2/0M. Gasperoni - M C - 0/0 R. Moroni - AM RLC - 10/2F. Pelliccioni - AM RLC - 1/0 M. Zanotti - AMC - 9/1D. Biordi - F RC - 0/0 A. Selva - S C - 23/7D. Conti - F LC - 7/2 G. Muratoria - S C - 2/0</pre>

enjikari

San Marino vs. Slovakia - World Cup Qualifying European Section Group 3
Serrvalle, Olimpico

San Marino - 4-1-3-2
<pre class="ip-ubbcode-code-pre"> D. Conti A. Selva ^ ^ ^ | | | | | | | | | | | | Subs: N. Chiaruzzi R. Moroni M. Zanotti A. Raschi D. Biordi D. Selva E. Gerini M. Bollini A. Francioni S. Celli M. ManciniA. Della Valle D. Casali P. Cupi E. Gerini N.Giardi</pre>

Slovakia - 4-4-2
<pre class="ip-ubbcode-code-pre"> L. Mezsaros S. Németh ^ ^ | | | | | | P. Sedlak Z. Strba I. Demo M. Kurty Subs: M. Kozacik J. Halenar J. Petras J. Kovac M. Breska P. Petras R. Konecny J. Pavlik S. Varga M. Stano T. Vencel I. Kostovski</pre>

enjikari

Davide Casali came in to make his first international start due to Gasperoni's suspension and Mirco Zanotti came back into the team after his recovery from injury, taking the place of Simone Celli. We had lost 6-0 away at Slovakia, but this was irrelevant in my opinion and I told the players I wanted to try and end with a positive results.

We started well and it seemed that the players wanted to end the qualifying campaign positively as well and, but for a superb tackle from Marian Stano, Daniele Conti would almost certainly have opened the score. However, one pinpoint long ball later, Németh found himself through on goal and with plenty of time to give the Slovakians the lead inside five minutes.

It was hard to tell whether we would let our heads drop and cave in or whether we would continue on from our good start to try and get back in the match. Thankfully, it was the latter of the two, and we turned the score around almost immediately. Bollini turned on the ball nicely and played it along to Casali. Casali crossed the halfway line and played the ball forward, looking for Zanotti. Zanotti got his head to the ball to flick it on to Selva and Selva beat the goalkeeper to the ball to make it one-all.

We didn't sit back after that however and, within a minute, we found ourselves two-one up. Moroni took a free kick on the halfway that went forward to Casali. Casali flicked it to Chiaruzzi and Chiaruzzi volleyed the ball across the face of the goal. The Slovakian defence was static and Andy Selva stole in to head the ball past a helpless Jan Hrncar in goal to give us the lead.

After the kick-off, it became obvious that both teams were willing to go all out to get victory. We were pressing forward looking for more goals, Francioni testing Hrncar with a good header, and Slovakia were pressing forward looking for a way back into the game, with Németh jinking past Casali before hitting a shot that was well saved by Giardi. Németh then had two more good chances to level the score before Andy Selva had a shot cleared off the line from Strba.

Both Selva and Moroni came close of giving us a three-one lead before Selva made history by completing his hat trick on the stroke of half time. Bollini took a throw-in to Moroni and Moroni turned well and got to the by-line. He checked back before standing the ball up for the cross, looking for one of our forward players. Meszaros was beaten in the air by Andy Selva and Selva headed the ball down into the bottom corner of the net, leaving the keeper with no chance. It was his tenth goal for San Marino and his fifth in the last three international games.

Surprisingly it was us who started the second half better, still coming forward looking for more. We had been here before though, against Norway, and had ended up losing so, I didn't want us to go all out for a fourth. We nearly found one however, through Daniele Conti, but his spectacular overhead kick shaved the post and went wide.

Meszaros then tried to get Slovakia back into the game with two good efforts, but on both occasions the angle turned out to be too tight and his shots flew wide of the target. Németh had one more chance for Slovakia before Conti had the last effort of the game when he hit a shot high and wide of the goal, but it didn't matter as we had run out three-one winners.

It was a fantastic team performance and we could now look forward to the draw for the qualifying campaign for Euro 2008, with a bit more confidence and self-belief than we had going into this campaign.

enjikari

<BLOCKQUOTE class="ip-ubbcode-quote"><font size="-1">quote:</font><HR>
San Marino Claim 'Famous' Victory

15.10.05

San Marino 3-1 Slovakia (World Cup Qualifying (European Section) Group 3)

San Marino's manager has urged fans and players not to get too carried away after their remarkable 3-1 victory over Slovakia.

Despite falling behind to the visitors through a goal from Szilard Németh (5), San Marino claimed their superb victory thanks to a first international hat-trick from star player Andy Selva (12, 17, 45). These three goals allowed twenty-nine year old Selva to become the first ever player to get into goalscoring double figures for the San Marinese national team.

San Marino did what they had hoped to do by finishing the qualifying campaign on a high with the win, their second win in the group, and they can now go into their friendly with Latvia in April of next year with hope of a better all-round performance in qualifying in Euro 2008. <HR></BLOCKQUOTE>

<pre class="ip-ubbcode-code-pre">|No. | Name | |Rat|Gls||No. | Name | |Rat|Gls||-----------------------------------------------||-----------------------------------------------|| 1 | Nicola Giardi | | 5 | || 1 | Jan Hrncar | | 6 | || 2 | Fabio Bollini | | 7 | || 2 | Marian Stano |(inj 61)| 6 | | | 3 | Alessandro Della Valle | | 7 | || 3 | Roman Konecny | | 6 | || 4 | Paolo Cupi | | 7 | || 4 | Stanislav Varga | | 7 | || 5 | Davide Casali | | 8 | || 5 | Jozef Pavlik |(sub 73)| 5 | || 6 | Alessandro Francioni | | 7 | || 6 | Marian Kurty (C) | | 7 | || 7 | Raffaele Moroni (C) | | 8 | || 7 | Pavol Sedlak | | 7 | || 8 | Simone Celli | | 8 | || 8 | Igor Demo | | 7 | || 9 | Nicola Chiaruzzi | | 7 | || 9 | Zdeno Strba (Bkd) |(sub 61)| 5 | ||10 | Daniele Conti | | 7 | ||10 | Szilard Németh | | 7 | 1 ||11 |* ANDY SELVA | |10 | 3 ||11 | Lubomir Meszaros | | 7 | ||-----------------------------------------------||-----------------------------------------------||12 | Andrea Raschi | | | ||12 | Matus Mozacik | | | ||14 | Davide Biordi | | | ||14 | Juraj Halenar | | | ||15 | Davide Selva | | | ||15 | Jan Petras | | | ||16 | Elia Gerini | | | ||16 | Jozef Kovac | (on 70)| 6 | ||17 | Michele Bollini | | | ||17 | Mario Breska | | | ||18 | Simone Cellini | | | ||18 | Peter Petras | (on 70)| 7 | ||19 | Michele Mancini | | | ||19 | Tomas Vencel | (on 61)| 7 | |</pre>

enjikari

WORLD CUP 2006 QUALIFYING - EUROPE - FINAL TABLES

In Group One, Croatia have gone through automatically, with Scotland finishing above England to get the play-off spot. England, Switzerland, Northern Ireland and Armenia will not qualify.
<pre class="ip-ubbcode-code-pre">Group 1 P W D L F A PTS-----------------------------------------------------------------Croatia (Q) 10 9 0 1 26 8 27-----------------------------------------------------------------Scotland (Pl) 10 6 1 3 13 8 19England 10 5 1 4 13 7 16Switzerland 10 4 2 4 14 15 14N.Ireland 10 3 2 5 8 15 11Armenia 10 0 0 10 8 21 0</pre>

In Group 2, Denmark automatically qualify with Poland beating Italy to the play-off spot by the virtue of goals scored. Italy, Georgia, Liechtenstein and Moldova will not qualify
<pre class="ip-ubbcode-code-pre">Group 2 P W D L F A PTS-----------------------------------------------------------------Denmark (Q) 10 8 0 2 28 7 24-----------------------------------------------------------------Poland (Pl) 10 5 4 1 20 9 19Italy 10 5 4 1 17 6 19Georgia 10 3 1 6 15 16 10Liechtenstein 10 2 1 7 10 34 7Moldova 10 1 2 7 8 26 5</pre>

With the last lot of games finished, that table has also been completed. Norway took the automatic route to Germany by beating Turkey in Instanbul in the last game, topping the group with Turkey securing the play-off spot from Slovakia. Macedonia finished fourth and we finished fifth, with Malta bottom. Wed did concede the most in the group and we scored joint least as well, but we managed to take points from three of our ten games.

<pre class="ip-ubbcode-code-pre">Group 3 P W D L F A PTS-----------------------------------------------------------------Norway (Q) 10 7 2 1 27 11 23-----------------------------------------------------------------Turkey (Pl) 10 6 3 1 23 6 21Slovakia 10 4 3 1 17 14 15FYR of Macedonia 10 2 5 3 10 13 11SAN MARINO 10 2 1 7 10 35 7Malta 10 0 2 7 4 11 5</pre>


<pre class="ip-ubbcode-code-pre">Results so far: | Saturday 10th September 2004 | | Slovakia 2-0 Malta | SAN MARINO QUALIFYING RESULTS SAN MARINO 4-5 Norway | FYR of Macedonia 1-1 Turkey | Norway 5-0 San Marino | FYR of Macedonia 2-0 San Marino Saturday 14th September 2004 | San Marino 1-5 Turkey | San Marino 1-0 Malta Norway 1-0 FYR of Macedonia| Slovakia 6-0 San Marino Turkey 1-0 Slovakia | San Marino 0-0 FYR of Macedonia Malta 6-1 SAN MARINO | Turkey 5-0 San Marino | San Marino 4-5 Norway Saturday 15th October 2004 | Malta 6-1 San Marino | San Marino 3-1 Slovakia Tureky 1-2 Norway | SAN MARINO 3-1 Slovakia | FYR of Macedonia 1-0 Malta |</pre>