Qatar’s Abdulla Mostafa Mohamed and Australia’s Mile Sterjovski fight for the ball in Brisbane yesterday. Picture by Jayaram

BRISBANE: Brett Emerton claimed a double and fellow European stars Tim Cahill and Josh Kennedy also got on the scoresheet as Australia outclassed Qatar 4-0 in their Asian World Cup qualifier yesterday.
The Australians followed up their 3-0 and 3-1 wins over the Gulf side for their third comprehensive victory in eight months of this year’s World Cup qualifying.
The Socceroos leapfrogged Qatar to the top of Group A with their second victory of the final qualifying phase after a 1-0 away win last month in Uzbekistan, setting themselves up nicely for their next assignment in Bahrain on November 19.
Australia, looking for back-to-back trips to the 2010 World Cup finals in South Africa after reaching the knockout round in Germany two years ago, were good value for their victory and had the game wrapped up on the hour.
“I’m not going to start running around with a bottle of champagne and celebrating yet, but it’s six points from two games and five goals with none conceded,” Australian coach Pim Verbeek said.
With Uzbekistan grabbing a 1-1 draw in Japan on Wednesday, the Australians are now by themselves on top of their group.
“That means that Uzbekistan will now be trying to win all their remaining games at home and our three points there are now fantastic, so tonight couldn’t get any better for us,” Australian skipper Lucas Neill said.
Yesterday’s result never looked in doubt after Cahill continued his amazing near one-in-two scoring rate for his country with a rapier finish in the ninth minute.
A long ball from Luke Wilkshire was helped on by David Carney and Kennedy to leave the Everton poacher unmarked on the left-hand side of the box to drill home for his 14th goal in 29 internationals.
Cahill was in the action again eight minutes later when he was impeded by Abdulla Koni as he attempted a mid-air volley and was awarded a penalty with Koni yellow carded.
Blackburn Rovers’ Emerton converted from the spot to give the confident Australians a two-goal buffer.
Magid Hassan gave the Australians their only anxious moment of the half when he fired across the goalmouth but no Qatari player was there to connect.
The Australians wrapped it up with Emerton’s second goal of the night, finishing off lead-up play from strikers Scott McDonald and Kennedy to ram the ball home in the 59th minute for a 3-0 advantage.
It was Emerton’s fourth goal in Australia’s last two games against Qatar.
Karlsruhe beanpole striker Kennedy capped a fine match when he headed home Wilkshire’s deep cross for Australia’s fourth goal with 14 minutes left.
The kick-off was delayed for 30 minutes after a fierce electrical storm deluged the ground.
The Qataris must now regroup under their new French coach Bruno Metsu for their third home match of the series against Japan next month.
“Playing Japan at home anything is possible and it’s an opportunity for us if we can beat them and we can get back into the running for the World Cup,” Metsu said.
“It was a difficult game for us tonight and we made some mistakes, but we have some advantages that came out of the match that we can work on for our next game.” (AFP)

Uzbekistan hold Japan