It was not the most convincing of displays from the European champions, but two quickfire first-half goals from Juanito and David Villa broke the deadlock after a quiet start before Carles Puyol wrapped up the scoring after the break.

Aside from keeping their World Cup bid on track, the victory also extended Spain's unbeaten run to 26 matches and saw the team break a national record for not conceding.

The previous record was set at 692 minutes, but that mark was eclipsed 74 minutes into Saturday's encounter in Tallinn.

Despite the seemingly one-sided scoreline, Spain can consider themselves lucky not to have been 1-0 down early on.

Vladimir Voskoboinikov found himself clean through on goal after being played onside, but Spain captain Iker Casillas was quickly out to the edge of his box and managed to deflect the Torpedo Moscow man's effort wide.

It was half-an-hour into the match before Spain finally managed to give Pavel Londak something serious to think about, with the Estonia goalkeeper getting down well to deflect away Fernando Torres' left-footed shot.

Spain need not have worried about their slow start though, as within seven minutes of that effort they had established a 2-0 lead.

The first goal came from an unlikely source, with centre-back Juanito notching only his third international effort after glancing home Xavi's free-kick, but Spain's second scorer was a much more familiar face.

Torres was sent tumbling inside the area by Alo Barengrub when trying to latch onto Villa's low cross, and from the resulting penalty Villa slammed his shot into the roof of the net for his 22nd goal in just 39 appearances for his country.

Spain's early problems were by now a distant memory and it was almost 3-0 in the 40th minute when Xavi broke through only to be denied by Londak.

The way Spain ended the opening period hinted at a dominant second half display from the world's top-ranked team, but Vicente del Bosque's side rode their luck before Puyol added a third goal in the 68th minute.

Estonia created four decent openings in quick succession just after the hour mark, with Konstantin Vassiljev the first man to miss out when he was denied by a superb save from Casillas after showing good chest control on the edge of the box.

Then from the following corner, Estonia captain Raio Piiroja missed a great chance at the far post when he mis-cued horribly, before Joel Lindpere blazed well wide from the same attack.

Estonia gave the Spanish more problems a minute later as well when Voskoboinikov got in behind the visiting defence, but although he managed to get round Casillas, he was pushed too wide and could not keep his final effort down with the goal gaping.

That three-minute spell was a big wake-up call for Spain, and they duly heeded it as five minutes later Puyol made it 3-0.

Torres was unlucky to see his header from Xavi's free-kick strike the crossbar, but Puyol was quick to pounce on the rebound to head home from virtually on the goalline.

That was the points sewn up for Spain and the visitors might have increased their advantage with a number of efforts in the closing stages, with Juanito going closest with a header that hit the bar.