Cacau shines as Germany down Hungary

Striker Cacau scored his third goal in two games for his adopted country to seal Germany's 3-0 win over Hungary in a World Cup warm-up friendly here on Saturday.

Brazilian-born Cacau, who qualified to play for Germany last year, came off the bench to add to the two goals he scored in the 3-0 win over Malta to strengthen his case for the starting line-up for Germany's World Cup side.

Germany start their World Cup campaign in Group D on June 13 against Australia and fly to South Africa on June 7 after their final warm-up game against Bosnia-Herzegovina next Thursday.

Alongside Cacau, Lukas Podolski and Mario Gomez weighed in with goals to cap impressive performances.

With Germany captain Michael Ballack injured and out of next month's World Cup, Bayern Munich striker Miroslav Klose took over the skipper's armband.

Having played in last weekend's Champions League final defeat, Bayern Munich quartet Bastian Schweinsteiger, Thomas Mueller, Hans-Joerg Butt and Germany's new World Cup captain Philipp Lahm were all rested.

Like Loew, Hungarian coach Erwin Koeman opted for a 4-2-3-1 formation with Augsburg forward Sandor Torghelle as the lone striker.

Germany opened the score at the Ferenc Puskas Stadium when Podolski, playing as an attacking midfielder, drilled in a long-range shot which Hungarian goalkeeper Gabor Kiraly palmed over the bar.

From the resulting corner, defender Per Mertesacker was fouled in the penalty area and referee Claus Larsen of Denmark had no hesitation awarding the penalty.

Kiraly dived to his left and Podolski rifled his shot into the top right-hand corner to make it 1-0 to Germany after four minutes.

To compound things for the hosts, defender Laszlo Bodnar was shown the first yellow card moments later for hauling down Podolski on the edge of the penalty area.

Germany hammered the Hungarian defence in the first 20 minutes with Bremen's Mesut Oezil going close with three clear chances to score.

Trochowski was booked in the 41st minute for a heavy tackle.

It finished 1-0 at the break, but early in the second-half Loew brought on Stuttgart striker Cacau for midfielder Oezil and defender Dennis Aogo came on for midfielder Sami Khedira.

Germany temporarily dropped their tempo in the second-half and with 60 minutes gone, Loew introduced Marcel Jansen for rising star Toni Kroos, Marko Marin for Trochowski and Gomez for Klose.

Marin, who was a constant threat, made an instant impression when he slid a pass through to Gomez who beat Kiraly on 69 minutes.

Kiraly's luck did not improve as his clearance kick was headed into the path of Cacau who drew the goalkeeper and tapped home his shot on 72 minutes to seal a convincing display from his side.