Madrid, Mar 15 (IANS): Real Madrid had little difficulty in qualifying for the last eight of the Champions League as they defeated CSKA Moscow 4-1 in the Santiago Bernabeu Stadium.

The win Wednesday, which came thanks to goals from Gonzalo Higuain, Cristiano Ronaldo and Karim Benzema, takes Madrid into the quarterfinals of the competition and keeps alive the club's hopes of winning a tenth European Cup, Xinhua reported.

Madrid started with two attacking midfielders in Kaka and Mesut Ozil on the pitch but it was a more defensive player, Sami Khedira who was to prove vital with a magnificent pass for Higuain to open the scoring after 25 minutes.

Higuain once again proved that he deserves a place in the Real Madrid starting line up with his fourth goal in three matches.

Ahmed Musa came close to levelling the score for the Russians before the break, but Iker Casillas showed he was alert to the danger with a good save.

Ronaldo doubled Madrid's lead 10 minutes into the second half as he shot from 30 meters and CSKA goalkeeper Sergie Chepchugov made a horrible mess of it, allowing it to bounce into the back of the net when he really should have made a save.

Karim Benzema replaced Higuain with 21 minutes remaining and wasted no time in staking his claim to a first team place by scoring the third goal a minute later.

Zoran Tosic gave his side a slim lifeline when he scored for CSKA with a fine individual goal with 13 minutes remaining, but Ronaldo rounded up the scoring in the last minute of injury time as he slotted home a Benzema cross.