With a convincing win Uruguay reached the semis first on a cloudy and windy day in Malta, at the FINA World Men's Water Polo Development Trophy. They sank Austria with 9-3 in a one-sided match, but at least offered some entertainment as they scored a couple of rather spectacular goals. Iran didn't have to go the distance either against Singapore, the Persians outpowered their rivals by and rolled over them in the third period. Group-winner Saudi Arabia was almost upset by Tunisia as the tournament's only winless side had a man-up in the dying seconds to force the shootout but couldn't put the ball away, so the Saudis advanced with a 10-9 win.

Steven Camilleri: the perfect 10

Malta joined the semis as the last team, they had an unexpectedly easy ride against Peru, decided the match by halftime when they were 10-3 up already. They set a new scoring record for this tournament by finishing the game with 21 goals, almost half of those came from Steve Camilleri who found back to his devastating scoring form and netted 10 goals in the evening. 

The favourite sides made the semis, so the Saturday night fever is expected to go really high here in Malta...

 

Schedule for Friday

For places 5-8

15.30: Peru v Tunisia

16.50: Austria v Singapore

Semi-finals

18.10: Uruguay v Iran

19.30: Malta v Saudi Arabia