The first round of qualifying for the European Championship 2020 saw the start of the English Premier League, which swept the Czech Republic with a clean five, as well as the "world champion" the French team, who beat away Moldova 4-1, while Portugal failed to lead Cristiano Ronaldo to win its home on Ukraine .

Thanks to the brilliance of star Rahim Sterling, England started the first round of Group A with a landslide victory at Wembley.

Streling scored a hat-trick in the 24th, 62nd and 67th minutes, while Harry Kane scored from a penalty in the first minute of the injury time and the Czech defender Thomas Calas scored the fifth goal in the 84th minute.

England scored the first three points to top the group, while the Czech Republic remained without points, and Bulgaria and Montenegro got just one point after a 1-1 draw.

England players celebrate Streling's first goal with Czech goal (Getty Images)

France also started their Group H games with a 4-1 victory over Moldova, which also saw Turkey beat Albania 2-0, and with the same result Iceland defeated Andorra.

France's Antoine Grizmann, Rafael Faran, Olivier Giroux and Kilian Mbabi scored in the 24th, 27th, 36th and 87th minutes respectively, while Moldova's Vladimir Ambros scored a face-saving goal in the 89th minute.

France had their first three points at the top of the table, and Moldova remained without points on the bottom of the table.

Jiro celebrates third goal for France amid frustration with Moldova players (Reuters)

While France and England were successful in the first European qualifying test, Portugal failed to win their home game with a 0-0 draw against Ukraine in the first round of Group B, where Luxembourg beat Lithuania 2-1.

Ronaldo's failure to return to Portugal after an absence of almost nine months in making the difference and translating one of his team's attacks to goals, to zero hands in his first participation since the World Cup Russia.

Luxembourg scored their first three points in the qualifying campaign to top the group standings, Lithuania tipped the standings without points, while Portugal and Ukraine were second with one point each.