The Ten Blunders By The Portugese Police In The First Hours Madeleine McCann Went Missing

BLUNDER ONE: Officers failed to cordon off the holiday apartment where Maddy was snatched as soon as they arrived. Amazingly, other tourists were allowed to stroll around the crime scene up to 24 hours later - potentially destroying clues and contaminating forensic evidence.

BLUNDER TWO: Police did not "lock down" the Mark Warner resort where the youngster was staying with parents Kate and Gerry, both 38, and their two-year-old twins Sean and Amelie. They refused to believe Maddy had been kidnapped and insisted she probably wandered off.

BLUNDER THREE: Border officials were not alerted until 12 hours after the snatch, meaning the kidnapper could have fled to Spain - only an hour's drive away from the holiday complex at Praia da Luz on the Algarve.

BLUNDER FOUR: Coastal patrols had to wait 14 hours to be told of last Thursday's snatch.

BLUNDER FIVE: Instead of amassing a huge force of officers to hunt for Maddy, just 150 were involved in the initial, badly organised searches. The scouring of 500 apartments did not begin until Sunday.

BLUNDER SIX: No direct appeal was made to the kidnapper in the hours after the crime. It was left to Maddy's distraught parents to publicly plea for help.

BLUNDER SEVEN: There were no officials posters of the missing child printed. Locals and Mark Warner staff produced their own. Police even refused to distribute pictures of Maddy until yesterday.

BLUNDER EIGHT: A complete list of guests at the resort was not gathered until Sunday, by which point many of them - potential witnesses - had left.

BLUNDER NINE: Police have still not identified any suspects, despite having the e-fit of a man with long hair which they showed only to locals. One restaurant worker said his wife saw a man fitting the description hanging around suspiciously outside their bar just 100 metres from the resort.

BLUNDER TEN: A detailed description of what Maddy was wearing when snatched was not issued. In fact, Portuguese police have maintained a wall of silence, claiming privacy laws stop them from revealing many details about their investigation.

So the Blunder Cops had no idea what they were doing