MADRID, OCTOBER 8: Cristiano Ronaldo led Portugal to a 6-0 demolition of Andorra in the second round of European football qualifiers for the 2018 World Cup here.
Ronaldo, whose last international appearance was in Portugal’s victory over France in the 2016 Euro Cup final, scored twice in the first three minutes on Friday, reports Efe.
The Real Madrid superstar added a brace in the second half and Joao Cancelo and Andre Silva contributed a goal each to complete the rout.
In other matches, France fell behind 1-0 to visiting Bulgaria, conceding on a penalty by Mihail Aleksandrov, but led 3-1 by halftime thanks to goals by Kevin Gameiro, Dimitri Payet and Antoine Griezmann.
Gameiro, returning to the national side after five years, scored again in the second half to make it 4-1 for the hosts.
The Netherlands posted their first home win in six matches, beating Belarus 4-1. Quincy Promes scored two goals and Davy Klaassen and Vincent Janssen scored one each respectively.
Belgium, playing at home, thrashed Bosnia-Herzegovina 4-0, Estonia beat Gibraltar by the same score, and Greece topped Cyprus 2-0.
Netherlands beat Belarus 4-1
The Netherlands football team scored a comfortable 4-1 win over Belarus in a 2018 World Cup qualifying Group A encounter in the De Kuip stadium in Rotterdam.
After the 1-1 draw in Sweden last month, the Dutch on Friday needed a win against Belarus, which had drawn 0-0 against France in the first tie.
Coach Danny Blind had lined up almost the same team as against Sweden, but he favoured Maarten Stekelenburg as goalkeeper over Jeroen Zoet and Rick Karsdorp debuted as right back for injured Daryl Janmaat, reports Xinhua.
The tandem Karsdorp-Quincy Promes worked well on the right side and the Dutch created several opportunities from the start. In the 15th minute, Promes opened the scoring, when he profited from sloppy defending by the visitors.
He scored his first goal in 15 internationals. In the 31st minute, the Spartak Moscow forward also produced the second goal, when he hit home after a deflected Dutch corner.
With the 2-0 score the Dutch gave away the initiative and Belarus created some chances before half-time.
An attempt by Mikhail Gordeychuk went beside the post and Sergei Kornilenko also went close. Belarus continued their good period in the second half and Aleksey Rios scored in the 47th minute from a Kornilenko cross.
Netherlands seemed to have lost track, but came back into the match and restored their momentum of the first half. After Vincent Janssen hit the post Davy Klaassen scored from the rebound in the 55th minute and with a smashing strike from outside the penalty area Janssen made it 4-1 in the 64th minute. The Dutch could have extended the scoring, but Georginio Wijnaldum hit the post.
With the win, Netherlands bagged four points in Group A, together with France, which beat Bulgaria 4-1 in Paris, and Sweden, which defeated Luxembourg 1-0 in Luxembourg.
On Monday, Netherlands will take on France in Amsterdam while Belarus will host Luxembourg and Sweden will face Bulgaria at home.
Substitute Valentin Stocker scored in the last minute to give Switzerland a 3-2 win against Hungary in the second round of the 2018 World Cup Group B football qualifying match here.
In the 51st minute, Switzerland’s Haris Seferovic opened the scoring but Hungarian striker Szalai Adam levelled the score two minutes later in the thriller on Friday.
Left back Ricardo Rodriguez restored Switzerland’s advantage in the 67th minute volleying home from Valon Behrami’s lofted cross for his first international goal, only for Szalai to again equalise four minutes later.
Stocker then scored the game-winning goal for Switzerland in the 89th minute.
“Hungary applied lots of pressure on us during the game which was intense and entertaining. Hungary came back at us twice, but we showed character at end,” Switzerland coach Vladimir Petkovic told reporters after the match.
His Hungarian counterpart Bernd Storck added: “It was a dynamic and good game, both teams gave all they had. We are very disappointed because we came back twice against a top team, but we made too many mistakes and they made us pay for them.”
After two rounds of matches, Hungary has got only one point while the Swiss went on top of Group B with six points from two matches.
