26 Mar 2011

Away wins for big guns in Euro qualifiers

1:57 pm on 26 March 2011

Spain, the Netherlands, France and Italy all top their respective 2012 European Championships qualifying groups after picking up wins - all of them away apart from the Spanish.

And the football World Cup holders had to fight back from 1-0 down to win 2-1 over the Czech Republic in Granada, David Villa sparing Spain's blushes with both goals to became his country's record goal-scorer. Villa now has 46 international goals, two more than Raul.

2010 World Cup runners-up the Netherlands thrashed Hungary 4-0, Italy snuck a 1-0 win in Slovenia and France won 2-0 at Luxembourg.

There were few witnesses to Serbia's resilience in a 2-1 comeback win over battling Northern Ireland in a match played behind closed doors in Belgrade while Belgium sprang a surprise in Austria with a 2-0 victory.

Serbia are third behind Italy and Slovenia in Group C while Belgium move to second in group A behind Germany.