European round-up: Barca are the only leaders not to struggle

Samuel, one of two red carded for Inter

There are still two points between Barcelona and Real Madrid but they both looked really good this weekend.

Barcelona were first up on Saturday and they thumped Racing Santander 4-0 at the Camp Nou. Iniesta, Henry and Marquez gave them a 3-0 half-time lead and Thiago added one in the second half to confirm the easy victory.

Not to be out done Real Madrid responded on Sunday by annihilating Villarreal 6-2 at the Bernabeu. Higuain with two, Kaka with two, Cristiano Ronaldo and Xabi Alonso from the spot for his first Real Madrid goal. Completed the scoring in an exhilarating display.

Third placed Valencia are languishing thirteen points behind Real Madrid with Sevilla another point further back despite a 3-1 win at Mallorca which saw them have two players sent off.

Inter are five points clear of Roma who hold a two point advantage over Milan having played a game more.

Inter drew 0-0 at home to Sampdoria despite some interesting refereeing that saw them reduced to nine men with Samuel and Cordoba sent off inside forty minutes. Midway through the second half the referee made things a little more even by reducing Sampdoria to ten, but Jose Mourinho will probably be happy with the point in the circumstances.

A Vucinic goal in the first half was enough to give Roma all three points at home to Catania, whilst Milan recovered from their defeat against Manchester United with a 2-0 win at Bari. Borriello and Pato scored the goals.

Bayer Leverkusen remain top of the league on goal difference and unbeaten all season although they were held to a 2-2 draw at Werder Bremen. Derdiyok put them ahead but the home side equalised before half-time. Kroos again gave the leaders the lead after the break but deep into injury-time Bremen found another equaliser.

Second placed Bayern Munich would have gone top with a win but they too were held to a draw, 1-1 at Nuremberg. Muller gave them the lead but Nuremberg equalised in the second half.

Third placed Schalke had a chance to close the gap but instead it grew to four points after they were beaten 2-1 at Wolfsburg. Kuranyi put them ahead in the first-half but two goals in six second-half minutes from Grafite gave last season’s champions the win.

PSV slipped up in Holland and allowed FC Twente to get back to within a point of them at the top. They remain unbeaten but a 1-1 draw at home to Sparta was a disappointing result. Bakkal gave them an early lead which they held onto until two minutes into stoppage time at the end of the match.

Twente picked up three points in an uninspiring 1-0 win over Willem II. The first-half goal came from Wisgerhof.

Third placed Ajax are a long way back but they just about stayed in touch as an own goal, a brace from De Jong and one from Suarez gave them a 4-0 win over Vitesse.

Bordeaux are three points clear at the top in France with a game in hand on nearest challengers Montpellier.

Lille, Lyon and Marseille are all within three points of the second placed club.

Montpellier made a mess of trying to take advantage of Bordeaux not playing and they went down 1-0 at St Etienne. Lille, Lyon and Marseille all took advantage of that slip up by winning their games.

Finally, Benfica have a lead at the top in Portugal. They are a point clear of Braga who lost for only the second time this season.

Whilst Benfica had the weekend off Braga faced a tough looking trip to third placed Porto. A win for Braga would have put them two points clear at the top and would have opened a gap of eleven points on their opponents.

As it turned out, Porto won the game at a canter 5-1. In doing so they have closed the gap to five and six points on the top two and may have just entered the title race. Their goals came from Raul Meireles, Pereira, Belluschi and a brace from Garcia.

Robbie Keane scored the goal that gave Celtic a 1-0 win over Dundee United and then said that the pressure was all on Rangers. Well, going into next week’s old firm derby Rangers are seven points clear with a game in hand. Not sure how you come to that conclusion really Robbie.

Panathinaikos are two points clear at the top in Greece from both Olympiakos and PAOK Salonica in what is very much a three horse race.

PAOK made it a three horse race by beating the leaders 2-1 and throwing the title race wide open. Meanwhile, Olympiakos were only drawing 1-1 at Ergotelis on what was a great weekend for PAOK.

Galatasaray lead the way in Turkey by a point from Fenerbahce.

The leaders were held to a 1-1 draw at Besiktas whilst Fenerbahce played third placed Bursaspor last night.