Fortini Ground

The ground sits where the British Army once levelled the outworks of the fortifications to create the St Lawrence Parade Ground. It was a patch of sand and asphalt that held the Vittoriosa Stars F.C. for a season before the city turned it into a car park. The name Fortini means small fort, and that is what it is now: a place that does not host football matches but still looks like it might.

The surface was not natural grass. What they do show is the way the space sits between the old stone walls and the modern street. There are no floodlights, no permanent stands, just a boundary marked in chalk and a crowd that stood shoulder to shoulder because 1,000 people can fill a small rectangle faster than you would think. The Maltese FA Trophy once brought a team from Kercem Ajax FC here, and the bookmakers were pricing a low-scoring game, which is what you expect from a match played on something harder than dirt.

There is no roof over the pitch anymore, and the seating has gone. The ground was used for sports activities prior to the Second World War by soldiers who only had so many options for recreation. After the war, the Vittoriosa football club submitted an application in 1950 to use the site, and they got it. The defunct Vittoriosa Rovers had been there before them, founded in 1906 and dissolved in 1936, so the connection to this particular piece of Birgu runs deeper than just one club. A car boot sale takes place on Sundays now, and the "Museums by Candlelight" festival parks its visitors here when the city centre is full.

It was a venue for the Maltese Challenge League, also known as the First Division, though the name does not carry the same weight today. You can still see the outline of the pitch if you know where to look. The relationship between the ground and the city has soured, in the sense that the city needs somewhere to put its cars more than it needs a football stadium. The ground is still there, between the fortifications and the road, waiting to be used again if a team ever wants to play on sand.