Slovakia certain the goals will flow

Slovakia forward Stanislav Šesták has warned Russia and the Republic of Ireland that the goals are destined to come for his side after they kept pace with their Group B rivals thanks to a fourth narrow 1-0 win on the road to Poland and Ukraine.

Coach Vladimír Weiss was less than impressed with his charges as they barely edged past section minnows Andorra for the second time this year, but crucially they now find themselves tied on 13 points with Russia and Ireland at the top of their pool. "We're satisfied," said Šesták, a half-time substitute at Štadión Pasienky. "Once again, we were only able to score one goal, but I believe more will come at important times in the qualifiers.

"We won and that's the most important thing. Andorra's defence was very good. I hope we'll be able to produce the same kind of performances we managed in our last qualifying campaign [for the 2010 FIFA World Cup] when we come up against strong opponents."

Ireland will provide their next competitive test on 2 September, with Russia due to visit the following month, and Miroslav Karhan agreed that the true test of Slovakia's quality is yet to come. "We won and that's all," said the veteran midfielder-turned-defender, the unlikely match-winner after 63 minutes on Saturday. "Of course, we should have added more goals and we had a lot of chances to do that, but everybody knows everything in our group will be decided in autumn."

"I don't think we underestimated our opponents," added Filip Šebo. "The game was all about the first goal and after we wasted our first three chances, Andorra began playing more carefully in defence and we became a little nervous. But then Miro Karhan broke through and he saved us."

Šebo's fellow forward Filip Hološko reserved much of the credit for Weiss, meanwhile, admitting the Slovakia coach felt obliged to give his players a dressing-down at half-time. "We were convinced we'd score but we had to wait for a long time after missing our first chances. Our coach had to raise his voice after the first half and I think this helped us."