Northern Ireland 2 Albania 0
SKIPPER Iain Dowie kept Northern Ireland's World Cup dream alive with a first-half double at Windsor Park to sink Albania and bring his scoring heartache to an end.
The West Ham striker, who has failed to net in the Premiership this season, his only two goals of the campaign for the Hammers came in the Coca-Cola Cup, showed his finishing instinct has returned with two classic strikes in the space of nine minutes.
They gave Bryan Hamilton's men the first win of their Group Nine campaign after a Windsor Park loss to Ukraine and a home draw with Armenia, and maintained the progress that began with last month's battling 1-1 draw in Germany.
And it took Dowie's international total to 10 in 39 matches, a tally that made him only the 11th man to reach double figures for the Irish, took him above the legendary George Best in the goal charts, and brought him to within three goals of Colin Clarke's all-time record.
Albania, marshalled at the back by Rudi Vata, the former Celtic player now plying his trade in Greece, rarely threatened danger.
Tommy Wright, the hero in Nuremberg, was rarely called on and the visitors looked more concerned with keeping the score down rather than getting back into the contest.
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