Juventus, Barcelona and Arsenal record victories: Champions League qualifying round

LONDON, Aug 14: Juventus look set to return to the Champions League proper for the first time in three seasons after crushing Artmedia Bratislava 4-0 at home in the first leg of their third qualifying round tie on Wednesday.

Barcelona also virtually sealed a place in the group stage with a 4-0 home win over Wisla Krakow of Poland. Samuel Eto’o showed some fine early season form with two goals, while Thierry Henry and Xavi were also on target for the 1992 and 2006 champions.

Arsenal, beaten by Barca in that 2006 final, were comfortable 2-0 winners at Dutch side Twente Enschede, now coached by former England manager Steve McClaren.

Anorthosis Famagusta of Cyprus also took an unlikely step towards the last 32 with an emphatic 3-0 win over Olympiakos Piraeus of Greece in the biggest upset of the night.

Juventus, the two-time European champions, last played in Europe in 2005-06 before their enforced relegation from Serie A after Italy’s match-fixing scandal.

But they quickly found the net against the Slovakian champions with a goal from Mauro Camoranesi after only eight minutes.

Alessandro Del Piero, Giorgio Chiellini and Nicola Legrottaglie were also on target for Claudio Ranieri’s side.

Arsenal seem set to join Juve, despite having had nine senior players missing against Twente. They dominated the second half and won with a scrappy goal from skipper William Gallas and simple tap-in from Emmanuel Adebayor.

Premier League rivals Liverpool were fortunate to escape from Belgium with a 0-0 draw against Standard Liege, who missed an early penalty when Dante’s poorly struck spot-kick was saved by goalkeeper Pepe Reina after 12 minutes.

Dynamo Kiev were also impressive, winning 4-1 at Spartak Moscow.

Spartak went ahead after only four minutes through Nikita Bazhenov but Dinamo rallied and were 3-1 up a minute after the break, with two of the goals coming from Ismael Bangoura.

Ukraine champions Shakhtar Donetsk also moved closer to the group stage after first-half goals from Darijo Srna and Jadson gave them a 2-0 home win over Croatia’s Dinamo Zagreb.

Turkish teams, whose national side were the comeback kings at Euro 2008, overturned two-goal deficits in their matches to end up drawing 2-2.

Champions Galatasaray trailed Steaua Bucharest 2-0 after just 12 minutes before striker Shabani Nonda scored twice to rescue a draw for the home side.

Fenerbahce have an even better chance of advancing despite having trailed 2-0 at Serbian champions Partizan Belgrade.

Daniel Guiza, signed last month by his former Spain coach Luis Aragones, got the equaliser for 2-2.

Levski Sofia of Bulgaria started the night hopeful of ending a run of eight successive defeats in the Champions League but finished it beaten again — and then lost their manager. They went down 1-0 at home to BATE Borisov of Belarus with coach Velislav Vutsov resigning immediately after the defeat.

Results (third qualification round, first leg):

Barcelona 4 Wisla Krakow (Poland) 0

Vitoria Guimaraes 0 Basel 0

Standard Liege 0 Liverpool 0

Partizan Belgrade 2 Fenerbahce 2

Sparta Prague 1 Panathinaikos 2

Twente Enschede 0 Arsenal 2

Juventus 4 Artmedia Petrzalka 0

Schalke04 1 Atletico Madrid 0

Brann Bergen 0 Olympique Marseille 1

Galatasaray 2 Steaua Bucharest 2

AaB Aalborg 2 FBK Kaunas 0