Stripes beaten 10-1 by Cardiff in Brondby

Birkirkara ended their commitments in the UEFA Women's Champions League in Denmark yesterday with another heavy defeat, a 1-10 upset to Welsh side Cardiff.

This was the third loss from as many matches for the Maltese champions in a qualifying mini-tournament that also featured host team Brondby and 1 Dezembro, of Portugal.

The Danes made it through to the next round of the competition after beating 1 Dezembro 1-0 in a decisive match yesterday. Brondby advanced with a perfect record of three wins.

Birkirkara, who lost to Brondy 6-0 and 1 Dezembro 10-0 in their previous matches, managed to open their scoring account in the second half yesterday when the score was already 9-0 for Cardiff.

Rachel Cuschieri was on mark on 55 minutes as Birkirkara raised their game after the break.

In fact, they conceded only one goal in the second period when Nicola Cousins completed Cardiff's scoring eight minutes from time. For Cardiff, Natasha Harding hit five goals inside the first half-hour of the match.

There were some eye-catching scores in the mini-tournament qualifiers, not least the 19-0 thrashing of Georgia minnows FC Norchi Dinamoeli Tbilisi by German giants Bayern Munich in a Group A match in Lithuania last weekend.

In all, seven mini-tournaments were played over the week with the winners joining holders Duisburg and the champions of the 24 top-ranked nations in the Round of 32 draw on August 14.

The other five teams joining Brondby and Bayern Munich in the next round were Linkoping (Sweden), Everton (England), Montpellier (France), Torres (Italy) and Rossiyanka (Russia).