Zoran Tošić gave the home side the lead in only the 3rd minute but the Danes' two goals in the 60th minute from Bendtner and Kjaer helped Martin Olsen's side to victory as Bendtner finished the game off late on.
This was Serbia’ first game after their infamous qualifier against Albania which ended with violent scenes after a Pro-Albanian flag carried by a drone was grabbed by Serbian Stefan Mitrović sparking a riot in the stadium and forcing the game to be abandoned. Dick Advocaat’s men were awarded a 3-0 victory afterwards but were subsequently deducted 3 points leaving them with 1 point after 2 games.
Denmark on the other hand sit joint-top of the group with 4 points alongside Albania, although the Danes have played a game more. They lost their last qualifier after Cristiano Ronaldo scored a 95th minute winner to give Portugal the 1-0 victory but before that they beat Armenia 2-1 before drawing 1 apiece with Albania. Morten Olsen made 3 changes to the side that lost to Portugal with Lars Jacobsen, Pierre Emil Højbjerg and Captain Daniel Agger being replaced by Andreas Bjelland, Peter Ankersen and Thomas Kahlenberg as Denmark lined up in a 4-3-3 formation. Serbia made 2 changes with Premier League duo Aleksandar Kolarov and Matija Nastasić out for Dusko Tošić and Milan Biševac.
Another result of the riot involving Serbia and Albania was that Serbia were forced to play this game behind closed doors in the Stadion Partizana, home to Partizan Belgrade. It created a very interesting environment but it didn’t seem to affect the players, as the action on the pitch was certainly entertaining.
Within 30 seconds we had our first costless kick of the game after Lasse Vibe went in very late on Southampton’s Dusan Tadić and the Danish winger was perhaps lucky to escape a caution for his foul. Only 2 minutes later Serbia opened the scoring with Tadić involved again this time he got away from his man by cutting inside before passing to Nemanja Gudelj who managed to touch it on for Zoran Tosić who found himself in acres of space inside the box. The former Manchester United winger took a touch before calmly sending the ball past goalkeeper Kasper Schmeichel in the Denmark goal.
The Eagles as Serbia are known continued their early pressure are it nearly paid off after young Filip Đuričić of Mainz picked up the ball at the back post and struck his cross into the ground causing it to bounce up and thus allowing Danko Lazović to attempt an overhead kick that was superbly saved by Schmeichel. The rebound fell to Zoran Tosić but he could only put his effort wide when he should’ve done better.
Serbia weren’t to have all the first half chances because in the 18th minute Kahlenberg passed to Vibe who nudged it on for Nicklas Bendtner but the Wolfsburg striker skied his effort. The former Arsenal then went down in the box in the 23rd minute and he started to appeal for a penalty but the referee denied him and replays showed there was not a lot of contact. He would be involved in the next chance after he received the ball off of a lovely touch from Christian Eriksen he passed to Vibe who ran past his defender before creating a chance that forced Vladimir Stojković to react quickly and he only just pushed it past the post.
The IFK Göteborg attacker then had another effort only 4 minutes later but again Stojković denied him this time from the edge of the area. Denmark controlled the play for the rest of the half with Kahlenberg having a shot straight into the ground and Vibe nearly charging down Stojković after the keeper took to long to get rid of the ball.
The away side continued where they left off in the 2nd half, within 3 minutes William Kvist found Eriksen on the edge of the box and the Tottenham midfielder cut inside before releasing an effort that came off the outside of the post. Bendtner then had 2 headed efforts in two minutes in the 56th and 58th minute but both times he could only head wide from decent positions but just as it looked like it wasn’t going to be his night the big Dane scored. Eriksen had a shot from the edge of the box that forced Stojković to get down sharply and palm the ball to his right but following up was Bendtner and he slotted home to bring his side level.
The Serbian defence then crumbled as they looked to regain their lead, a minute after Bendter scored the away side took the lead due to some lax defending. A brilliant costless kick from Nicolai Boilesen found Simon Kjaer at the back post and the Lille man smashed home his header. Kjaer was unmarked after Nemanja Matić, who had probably been Man of the Match until that point, let him get costless inside the box. The Chelsea man didn’t let it get to him as 2 minutes later he drove towards the goal line before cutting back for Lazović who it seemed had no luck in this game as he hit the underside of the crossbar after his earlier overhead effort was superbly saved.
The response from the Danes was to go up the other end and do exactly the same themselves with Peter Ankersen running the nearly the whole length of the pitch before cutting inside and getting away a superb curled effort that hit the underside of the bar. Vibe was another who didn’t have his shooting boots because in the 68th minute he yet again wasted a brilliant through ball from Eriksen and was forced to pass to Bendtner who sent his effort well over.
In the final 20 minutes Olsen’s side had chance after chance to finish the game off, first Michael Krohn-Dehli received the ball from Eriksen after some nice build-up and had a shot that was cleared off the line by Branislav Ivanović. Then Vibe had yet another shot saved by Stojković. One solitary chance did fall to Serbia, substitute Zdravko Kuzmanović chipped the ball over the defence for fellow substitute Lazar Marković but Boilesen covered brilliantly and produced what was probably a goal-saving tackle.
The Danes finally finished the game off in the 84th minute when following the Serbia chance they countered with Vibe down the right and he passed to Bendtner who sent it out towards the right wing to Krohn-Dehli who then picked out an inch perfect cross to the feet of Bendtner as the striker continued his run inside the box and had the time to take a touch before sliding the ball past the oncoming keeper.