{"id":45652,"date":"2014-09-08T07:30:10","date_gmt":"2014-09-08T07:30:10","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/4cd.e16.myftpupload.com\/?p=45652"},"modified":"2014-09-08T08:45:49","modified_gmt":"2014-09-08T08:45:49","slug":"portugal-beaten-by-albania-in-euro-2016-qualifier","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/?p=45652","title":{"rendered":"Portugal beaten by Albania in Euro 2016 qualifier"},"content":{"rendered":"<p id=\"story_continues_1\">Albania &#8211;\u00a0ranked 70th in the world\u00a0\u00a0&#8211; produced a major surprise as Portugal&#8217;s Euro 2016 Group I qualifying campaign got off to a terrible start in Aveiro.<\/p>\n<p>A volley from Bekim Balaj proved enough to sink the 2012 semi-finalists.<\/p>\n<p>Portugal were without Cristiano Ronaldo but still fielded a strong side that included included\u00a0Manchester United&#8217;s on-loan Sporting Lisbon\u00a0winger Nani.<\/p>\n<div>\n<table>\n<colgroup>\n<col width=\"100%\" \/><\/colgroup>\n<thead>\n<tr>\n<th>\n<h2>Portugal&#8217;s last four results<\/h2>\n<\/th>\n<\/tr>\n<\/thead>\n<tbody>\n<tr>\n<td><strong>7 Sept:<\/strong>\u00a0Home v Albania Euro 2016 qualifier 0-1 Lost<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td><strong>26 June:<\/strong>\u00a0v Ghana World Cup 2-1 Won<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td><strong>22 June:<\/strong>\u00a0v USA World Cup 2-2 Draw<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<tr>\n<td><strong>16 June:<\/strong>\u00a0v Germany World Cup 0-4 Lost<\/td>\n<\/tr>\n<\/tbody>\n<\/table>\n<\/div>\n<p>Elsewhere, Robert Lewandowski hit four goals as newcomers\u00a0<strong>Gibraltar\u00a0<\/strong>lost 7-0 to\u00a0<strong>Poland\u00a0<\/strong>in Group D.<\/p>\n<p>There was to be no fairytale for the minnows in a tough group which also includes world champions Germany, the Republic of Ireland, Scotland and Georgia.<\/p>\n<p>Kamil Grosicki also scored two for the Poles, while Lukasz Szukala joined them in finding the net.<\/p>\n<p><strong>Denmark\u00a0<\/strong>had to come from behind to beat\u00a0<strong>Armenia,\u00a0<\/strong>Thomas Kahlenberg settling the Group I encounter in Copenhagen.<\/p>\n<p>The\u00a0<strong>Faroe Islands,\u00a0<\/strong>ranked 183 in the world, took the lead against\u00a0<strong>Finland\u00a0<\/strong>before losing 3-1 in Group F, while\u00a0<strong>Romania\u00a0<\/strong>won 1-0 away to\u00a0<strong>Greece\u00a0<\/strong>in the same group.<\/p>\n<p>&#8211;<\/p>\n<p>Source: BBC Sport<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>Albania &#8211;\u00a0ranked 70th in the world\u00a0\u00a0&#8211; produced a major surprise as Portugal&#8217;s Euro 2016 Group I qualifying campaign got off to a terrible start in Aveiro. A volley from Bekim Balaj proved enough to sink the 2012 semi-finalists. Portugal were without Cristiano Ronaldo but still fielded a strong side that included included\u00a0Manchester United&#8217;s on-loan Sporting [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":20,"featured_media":45653,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jnews-multi-image_gallery":[],"jnews_single_post":[],"jnews_primary_category":[],"jnews_social_meta":[],"jnews_override_counter":[],"footnotes":""},"categories":[],"tags":[120,29,2113,3],"class_list":["post-45652","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","tag-billboard-advertising","tag-dr-mahamudu-bawumia","tag-ghana-education","tag-ghana-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45652","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/20"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=45652"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/45652\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/media\/45653"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=45652"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=45652"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/citifmonline.com\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=45652"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}