Rio Maior never got started
Three minutes. That is how long Casa Pia lasted last night before Gianluca Prestianni put Benfica in front at the Estadio Municipal de Rio Maior. Rafa Silva made it two on 14 minutes. There were still 76 minutes to play and the home crowd already knew how the evening was going to end.
Benfica had arrived carrying one point from their opening fixture, a draw against Academico de Viseu that raised a familiar question about where the goals were coming from. The answer took about a quarter of an hour to arrive, and then it kept arriving.
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Seven minutes, three goals
Vangelis Pavlidis scored in the 47th minute. He scored again in the 49th. He completed the hat-trick in the 54th. Three goals in the space of seven minutes, and a scoreline reading 5-0 before the hour mark.
The Greece striker was not finished shaping the night either. Lawrence Ofori turned the ball into his own net in the 58th minute, and Jhon Duran struck three minutes later for the seventh. Benfica scored five times inside the opening 16 minutes of the second half, which is the kind of spell that turns a routine away trip into a highlight reel.
Casa Pia ended the match with ten men. Kaly collected a second yellow card in stoppage time, closing out an evening the home side will want to forget quickly.
A stubborn record finally broken
The win lifts Benfica to four points from two matches, and it settles something that had been nagging at them. Casa Pia had gone three straight league meetings without losing to Benfica, an unusual run against a club of that size in a league of this shape. Seven goals is an emphatic way to end it.
For Pavlidis, the treble arrives at a useful moment. Benfica spent the opening weekend looking short of a cutting edge, and their striker answered by scoring more goals in seven minutes than the team managed in its entire first fixture. Rio Maior has hosted plenty of awkward afternoons for the big Lisbon clubs. This was not one of them.
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