Mikel Merino bagged a goal and Martin Zubimendi produced an assist as Spain got their World Cup qualifying campaign off to the perfect start with a 3-0 win in Bulgaria.<\/p>\n
In a dominant first half, Zubimendi helped get the scoring underway, setting up Mikel Oyarzabal with a fine through ball. Chelsea’s Marc Cucurella doubled the lead before Merino’s header made it 3-0 before half-time – his fifth goal for his country.<\/p>\n
Spain head to Turkey for their second group stage match, with both sides on three points apiece.<\/p>\n
Elsewhere in Europe, Leandro Trossard<\/strong> came off the bench in a 6-0 victory over Liechtenstein. Leo replaced Kevin De Bruyne on 67 minutes as goals from Maxim De Cuyper, Arthur Theate, De Bruyne, Malick Fofana, and two from Youri Tielemans sealed the win for the Red Devils.<\/p>\n Martin Odegaard<\/strong> looked bright as he played the first half in Norway’s 1-0 win over Finland in an international friendly. Erling Haaland scored the only goal of the game from the penalty spot after Andreas Schjelderup was felled. Norway turn their attentions to World Cup qualifying, hosting Moldova next week. Jurrien Timber<\/strong> was an unused substitute in Netherlands’ 1-1 draw at home to Poland.<\/p>\n Maldini Kacurri <\/strong>made his senior debut for Albania, starting in a 1-0 win against Gibraltar in an international friendly. Albania next face Latvia in a World Cup qualifier on September 9.<\/p>\n Over in South America, Gabriel Martinelli, Gabriel Magalhaes <\/strong>and Piero Hincapie<\/strong> all started their respective World Cup qualifiers.\u00a0<\/p>\n New signing Piero played the full 90 minutes in Ecuador’s 0-0 draw in Paraguay, enough to give the hosts the point they needed to qualify for the World Cup next year.\u00a0<\/p>\n Piero is part of a backline that has conceded just five goals in 17 World Cup qualifiers, the best on the continent, keeping 12 clean sheets in the process. Piero and Ecuador round off qualifying by hosting Argentina.<\/p>\n In Brazil, our Gabis stepped out at the Maracana in a routine victory over Chile. Big Gabi played the full 90 minutes, with Martinelli coming off on 71 minutes for Lucas Paqueta. The West Ham United attacker netted, with goals from Estevao and Bruno Guimaraes also scoring in Rio de Janeiro. Brazil finish qualifying with a trip to Bolivia.<\/p>\n Thursday, September 4\u00a0<\/strong> Liechtenstein 0-6 Belgium Bulgaria 0-3 Spain Netherlands 1-1 Poland Gibraltar 0-1 Albania\u00a0 Friday, September 5<\/strong> Brazil 3-0 Chile Spain U21 (Mosquera) v Cyprus\u00a0 Italy v Estonia (Calafiori)\u00a0 Slovenia v Sweden (Gyokeres)\u00a0 Saturday, September 6 \u00a0<\/strong> Sunday, September 7\u00a0<\/strong> Belgium v Kazakhstan (Trossard)\u00a0 Turkey v Spain (Raya, Merino, Zubimendi)\u00a0 Monday, September 8\u00a0<\/strong> Israel v Italy (Calafiori)\u00a0 Kosovo v Sweden (Gyokeres)\u00a0 Tuesday, September 9 \u00a0<\/strong> Norway v Moldova (Odegaard)\u00a0 Serbia v England (Lewis-Skelly, Rice, Eze, Madueke)\u00a0 Albania (Kacurri) v Lativa Wednesday, September 10\u00a0<\/strong> Bolivia v Brazil (Gabriel, Martinelli) \u00a0 \u00a0<\/p>\n Copyright 2025 The Arsenal Football Club Limited. Permission to use quotations from this article is granted subject to appropriate credit being given to www.arsenal.com as the source.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Mikel Merino bagged a goal and Martin Zubimendi produced an assist as Spain got their World Cup qualifying…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":399748,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[2],"tags":[13,12,14],"class_list":{"0":"post-399747","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-news","8":"tag-headlines","9":"tag-news","10":"tag-top-stories"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@uk\/115151249270166626","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/399747","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=399747"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/399747\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/399748"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=399747"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=399747"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=399747"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}
Norway 1-0 Finland
Friendly | Odegaard plays first half<\/p>\n
World Cup qualifier | Trossard played 23 minutes as a substitute<\/p>\n
World Cup qualifier | Merino scores, Zubimendi assists, Raya an unused sub<\/p>\n
World Cup qualifier | Timber an unused sub<\/p>\n
Friendly | Kacurri played the full 90 minutes<\/p>\n
Paraguay 0-0 Ecuador
World Cup qualifier | Hincapie played full 90 minutes<\/p>\n
World Cup qualifier | Gabriel played full 90 minutes, Martinelli played 72 minutes<\/p>\n
Euro U21 qualifier | Soria | 7pm<\/p>\n
World Cup qualifier | Bergamo | 7.45pm<\/p>\n
World Cup qualifier | Ljubljana | 7.45pm<\/p>\n
England v Andorra (Lewis-Skelly, Rice, Eze, Madueke)\u00a0
World Cup qualifier | Birmingham | 5pm<\/p>\n
Lithuania v Netherlands (Timber)\u00a0
World Cup qualifier | Kaunas | 5pm<\/p>\n
World Cup qualifier | Brussels | 7.45pm<\/p>\n
World Cup qualifier | Konya | 7.45pm<\/p>\n
Kazakhstan U21 v England U21 (Nwaneri)
Euro U21 Qualifier | Pavlodar | 4pm<\/p>\n
World Cup qualifier | Debrecen, Hungary | 7.45pm<\/p>\n
World Cup qualifier | Pristina | 7.45pm<\/p>\n
Kosovo v Spain U21 (Mosquera)
Euro U21 qualifier | Pristina | 6pm<\/p>\n
World Cup qualifier | Oslo | 7.45pm<\/p>\n
World Cup qualifier | Belgrade | 7.45pm<\/p>\n
World Cup qualifier | Tirana | 7.45pm<\/p>\n
Ecuador (Hincapie) v Argentina
World Cup qualifier | Guayaquil | 12am<\/p>\n
World Cup qualifier | El Alto | 12:30am<\/p>\n