Wales captain Craig Bellamy showed his side what they had been missing with two goals as the Welsh pulled off an impressive 5-2 win over Slovakia in Trnava.
The 28-year-old sat out last Saturday's comprehensive 2-0 defeat by Group D leaders Germany in Cardiff for personal reasons, but the Welsh skipper scored two first-half goals as Wales came from behind to seal an impressive win.
The result leaves Wales fifth, level on ten points with Slovakia who have a better goal difference.
The guests got off to a bad start when Slovakia's captain Marek Mintal was left unmarked in the box and rifled his shot home on 12 minutes.
Wales then got themselves level when Bellamy won the ball on the edge of the area and flicked a pass to Joe Ledley for the Cardiff City winger to cross for Freddy Eastwood to score his second goal in three games on 22 minutes.
The Welsh took the lead when Bellamy beat defender Jan Durica for pace and lobbed his shot over Slovak keeper Stefan Senecky on 34 minutes.
And the West Ham United striker followed that up just seven minutes later when he slammed home Ledley's through ball four minutes before half-time to make it 3-1 at the break.
But the home side pulled it back to 3-2 on 57 minutes as Mintal took his chance and held off two defenders to slod his shot under Wales keeper Wayne Hennessey.
Slovakian defender Durica capped a bad night when he made it 4-2 to Wales by turning the ball into his own net before Simon Davies made it 5-2 as he added the fifth deep in injury time.
