(Football news) Real Madrid went five points clear at the top of the La Liga table after a 4-1 victory over Valencia. Two goals by Karim Benzema and Vinicius Jr. were enough for the Los Blancos to seal the three points, an important result considering that Barcelona had already drawn 1-1 to Granada while Atletico Madrid drew 2-2 against Villareal. 

Karim Benzema opened the scoring after dispatching a penalty kick in the 43rd minute when Casemiro went down in the box. Vinicius Jr. doubled the advantage in the 52nd minute after good combination play with Benzema and finishing the move by slotting the ball past Jasper Cillessen. If that wasn’t all the Brazilian scored another in the 61st minute, capitalizing on the opportunity when Valencia's keeper spilled Marco Asensio's shot.

Valencia did manage to score a consolation goal through Goncalo Guedes in the 76th minute but it was too little, too late as Benzema scored his second of the night in the 88th minute to seal the victory for the Los Blancos. With this result, Carlo Ancelotti’s team is on 49 points, five points ahead of 2nd place Sevilla who defeated Getafe 1-0 on Sunday.

Barcelona failed to take the chance of entering the top 4 in the La Liga after being held to a 1-1 draw against Granada at the Los Cármenes. Xavi’s team put up a rather mediocre performance despite having majority of the possession. Granada also had their moments on the counter-attack but never really looked like scoring either. However, the Blaugrana broke the deadlock in the 57th minute when a sensational cross by Dani Alves was headed home by Luuk De Jong.

This prompted the home team to really go for the equalizer and Gavi getting a second yellow card in the 79th minute, thereby reducing Barcelona to 10 men only gave the hosts an advantage. Granada changed their tactics and added more bodies to the attack which eventually paid dividends as a corner sent into the box hit Sergio Busquets and fell to Antonio Puertas who scored the equalizer in the 89th minute. The final whistle blew with both the sides at 1-1 and were forced to share the spoils of the fixture.

The reigning La Liga champions Atletico Madrid were held to a high scoring 2-2 draw against Villarreal at the El Madrigal. Diego Simeone’s team were the first to score through striker Angel Correa in the 10th minute but the advantage was short-lived as Pau Torres equalized in the 29th minute from a freekick rebound. The hosts then went ahead early in the second half when Alberto Moreno scored in the 58th minute with a low shot but Geoffrey Kondogbia restored parity in the 67th minute by scoring past goalkeeper Geronimo Rulli. 

With this result Atletico Madrid are fourth on the table with 33 points from 20 games while Villarreal are eighth with 29 points. 

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