First Team's 2011-2012 season roundup

by Ayrton Galea - 16th May 2012

On Friday evening, the Birkirkara FC's First Team ended their Premier League and season commitments with a 3-0 win over Balzan Youths to end in the top three for the 16th consecutive year. In the following detailed roundup, we are going through the highlights of this season.

When one looks back on this season, one could judge it as a roller-coaster ride, with lack of consistency probably being once again the biggest characteristic of this season.

The season began with positive performances and the Birkirkara supporters started to have high hopes for the rest of the season but these soon faded away due to negative and disappointing performances which including elimination from the U*BET FA Trophy at an early stage.

Although the January Transfer Market's acquisitions took a bit to settle down, the performances improved a lot especially in the Championship Pool phase which saw ‘The Stripes' ending this season on a positive note.

Euro Challenge Cup

The 2011-2012 season was on the way, and Birkirkara were involved in the first competition of the season in which serves as a preparation for the UEFA matches.

In the first match of the season, which was played on the 20 June, Birkirkara dominated for long stretches but they still failed to score to end the match in a goal-less draw against Floriana.

After Valletta defeated Floriana, the match between Birkirkara and Valletta was a decisive one with Birkirkara needing maximum points to win the Cup while for Valletta a draw would be enough.

In an entertaining match played on the 23 June, Birkirkara and Valletta shared the spoils in a 2-2 draw with the Birkirkara goals scored thanks to a brace by Alan Tabone. With this draw, Valletta won the first honour of the season and Birkirkara took the runners-up spot.

UEFA Europa League

For the 15th consecutive year, Birkirkara took part in UEFA Competitions and since they ended in the third place in the previous Premier League, they qualified for a berth in the UEFA Europa League.

The draws which were held in Nyon on Monday, 20 June, and Birkirkara were drawn to face the Albanian side, KF Vllaznia.

In the first leg, which was played on Thursday, 30 June at the Hibernians Stadium, an early goal after just two minutes was enough for the visitors to defeat Birkirkara with a 1-0 score.

One week later on Thursday, 7 July, Birkirkara managed to achieve a positive 1-1 result in the away match, but this was not enough, as Vllaznia qualified with a 2-1 aggregate score.

Mosta Tournament

Following elimination from the Europa League with heads held high, Birkirkara began to focus more on the upcoming Premier League and they took part in the friendly quadrangular Mosta Tournament.

In the opening match of the tournament, which was played on the 25th July, Birkirkara conceded a 2-1 defeat against hosts Mosta with the latter scoring a late winning goal. The goal for Birkirkara was scored by Leighton Grech.

Birkirkara registered a comfortable 4-1 victory in the second match which was played on the 29th July, with Moises Avila Perez, who was still on trial with our Club scored a hat-trick with the other goal scored by Ryan Camenzuli who scored his first goal with the First Team.

The third and last match which was played on the 31 July, once again saw Moises Avila Perez impressing everyone present with another hat-trick when Birkirkara picked up an easy 5-1 win over Vittoriosa. Besides the hat-trick of the Spanish striker, the other two goals was scored by Alan Tabone and an own goal.

Birkirkara ended the runners-up of this tournament with six points, three points behind winners Mosta who won all the three matches.

Premier League

The most prestigious competition in Malta had arrived, and after what they saw in the pre-season preparations, the Birkirkara supporters had high hopes for this league campaign.

As said earlier, these quickly faded away with Birkirkara's inconsistency being clear to notice.

However, after all the emotions that were shared in this competition, Birkirkara still managed to end up in third place and keeping their record of top three, for the 16th consecutive year.

Matches

Birkirkara played the opening match of the Premier League on the 19 August against Qormi in which ‘The Stripes' won with a 2-0 score.

Birkirkara ended the first phase, which was made up of the first two rounds on the 4 March thanks to a fine 3-1 win over Hamrun Spartans.

The Championship Pool began with another comfortable 3-1 win, on the 14 March against Floriana.

Birkirkara ended their Championship Pool and Premier League commitments on Friday 11 May with an easy 3-0 win over Balzan Youths.

Team Statistics

Birkirkara played 32 matches in which they won seventeen times, drew four times and they were defeated eleven times. They scored 55 goals while conceding 37 goals.

Birkirkara failed to find the net in 8 matches while they registered a clean-sheet 13 times.

The biggest win was registered on the 9 April, when Birkirkara humiliated Balzan Youths with a 5-0 score. The biggest defeat also was with a 5-0 score, when on the 4 December, Hibernians defeated Birkirkara with ease.

The earliest goal scored in this competition was on the 18 February, against Tarxien Rainbows, by Jorge Santos Silva who managed to find the net after just two minutes in the 3-1 win against Tarxien Rainbows.

The latest goal scored was scored on the 14 March, against Floriana, by Moises Avila Perez who scored a late goal on the 89th minute in the 3-1 fine win over Floriana.

The best streak for Birkirkara was registered between 18 February and 9 April when Birkirkara went through seven matches unbeaten by winning five matches and drawing twice.

On the other hand the worst streak was registered between the 21 November and the 8 January when they lost four out of five matches, conceding eight goals and scoring only one.

The best month for ‘The Stripes' was March where they were unbeaten throughout. They won three and drew twice, scoring nine and conceding four. On the other hand, the worst month was November when they only won match out of four, as they drew once and lost twice, scoring four goals and conceding six.

No less than ten penalties were given in favour of Birkirkara, out of which seven were converted to goals. Only two penalties were given against and both were saved by Jorge Mora.

Players Statistics

Mr. Paul Zammit made use of no less than thirty players throughout this season. Gareth Sciberras was the player that was utilised most with Birkirkara FC in the Premier League as he played thirty one out of thirty two matches. Alan Tabone was the player most utilised as a substitute. He came on as a substitute eleven times, followed by Ryan Camenzuli, with ten times.

The top scorer for Birkirkara was Moises Avila Perez who scored fifteen goals while the player that won the man of the match most was Shola Shodiya with three times.

U*BET FA Trophy

After Birkirkara's Premier League hopes had already faded away in just five months, many thought that Birkirkara could make up for this disappointment in the U*BET FA Trophy but this was not to be as they were eliminated in the fourth round.

Birkirkara played their first match in the third round when on the 18 December they crushed Vittoriosa Stars with a 4-0 result thanks to goals by Shola Shodiya, Gareth Sciberras, Shaun Bajada and Moises Avila Perez.

In the fourth round match, which was played on the 22 January, Birkirkara came back from two goals behind but they still lost the match, when Hamrun Spartans scored the third and decisive goal on the 78th minute which meant an elimination at an early stage from the second most prestigious competition.

Despite all the low points of this season, Birkirkara still managed to qualify for the UEFA Europa League. Surely every supporter wants a stronger challenge in the upcoming season for the main honours following the let-downs of this year.

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