Portugal 5
Malta 0

Malta’s woes in the UEFA U-17 Championship mini-tournament showed no signs of abating yesterday as Silvio Vella’s team suffered another heavy defeat, this time to Portugal.

Coming from a 6-0 drubbing to Scotland on Friday, Malta set off on a damage limitation mission against the hosts but two first-half goals from Freiburg striker Daniel Simoes and Juventus defender Pedro Justiniano put paid to Maltese hopes of attaining a res-pectable result.

The Maltese were never in the game as they lacked the energy and skills to stem the waves of Portuguese attacks with goalkeeper Rashed Al-Tumi the only player to emerge with any credit despite the upset.

In fact, the margin of defeat would have been much wider but for a string of fine saves from the Malta no.1 including a penalty block on Umaro Embalo on 79 minutes.

Malta’s resistance lasted until the 31st minute when Simoes opened the score and Justiniano then made it 2-0 just before the break.

The second half saw Portugal upping the tempo, scoring three other goals to seal their win and qualification to the next round along with Scotland who beat Wales 1-0 in the other group match yesterday.

On 50 minutes Gonzalo Costa made it 3-0 from a free-kick and fears of another drubbing loomed large for Malta when Tiago Rodrigues made it 4-0 with 17 minutes left.

With Malta out for the count, Portugal pushed for more but Al-Tumi stopped Embalo’s penalty.

But a couple of minutes later, Malta conceded another penalty. This time, Rodrigo Conceicao made no mistake from the spot.

Malta complete their group commitments with a match against Wales on Wednesday.

The Welsh team are also without points as they lost the opener to Portugal 2-0 on Friday.