Danes qualify

Denmark’s Christian Eriksen scored a hat-trick in a 5-1 thrashing of a disjointed Ireland in their playoff second leg yesterday in Dublin to secure the final European berth at next year’s World Cup. Denmark trailed to an early Shane Duffy header but took control immediately and struck twice in three minutes, first when Andreas Christensen’s stabbed effort on the half hour mark hit the post and went in off Ireland’s Cyrus Christie. That was followed by a superbly swept home second from Eriksen, who then made sure of victory with a left-footed effort on 64 minutes and completed his hat trick following poor defending 10 minutes later. Nicklas Bendtner added a late penalty for the Danes.