Belgium thrashes Hungary 4-0 to advance to quarterfinal

“Yes”, was the characteristically precise response from a man of few words.

After an impressive group stage for Hazard, where he bagged two assists, Belgium faced the surprise outfit in Hungary for a chance to progress to the last 16.

Just seconds after Hungary had miserably kicked off following Batshuayi’s goal, Hazard stepped up to the plate to culminate his extraordinary performance with an absolutely exquisite strike.

But Kiraly was by far the busier of the two keepers and he had to be alert to tip De Bruyne’s excellent free-kick onto the crossbar on 35 minutes, with Lukaku heading over on the follow-up.

“We should have been 3-0 up after the first half”, Belgium coach Marc Wilmots lamented.

Balazs Dzsudzsak forced Thibaut Courtois, who had earlier got away with an embarrassing slip, into a decent save at the other end, but Kiraly was soon called upon again to keep Hungary in the game.

Despite Sunday’s emphatic win, Wilmots was upset about Belgium’s failure to translate first half dominance into goals. The defense kept the zero for the third time in a row and my four offensive players created a lot of chances and scored 4 goals.

Host France set up a quarter-final clash on Monday morning with either England or Iceland, which played tonight, after a come-from-behind win over Ireland.

Belgium, ranked second in the world, was one of the pre-tournament favorites.

“We now play a Wales team we know well”.

The defender injured his shoulder colliding with team mate Jonny Williams in the 1-0 win over Northern Ireland, but manager Chris Coleman has eased fears over the experienced defender.

“There are a lot of people who are amazed that I gave him the captain’s armband but you have to let this little man grow up”, said Wilmots.

“We’re going to try to go all the way to the final, ” De Bruyne said.

Hungary pushed for a leveller in the second half, but Hazard’s late intervention ended any hope of a comeback.

Belgium goalkeeper Thibault Courtois made a fine save to deny Adam Pinter while Roland Juhasz fired inches wide of the far post when well placed. If only, thought Bernd Storck, they had been as switched on from the beginning.

“I told Eden that I wanted to score a goal by cutting inside”. We saw the difference on the pitch.

“We’re into the quarter-finals, but we’ve done nothing yet”, said Wilmots, who will be without defender Thomas Vermaelen after he picked up a yellow card to trigger a one-match suspension.