Real maintain lead, Barca held

Real maintain lead, Barca held
Agencies

Madrid, March 12: Real Madrid maintained their five-point lead at the top in Spain with a classy 4-0 victory over struggling Real Sociedad yesterday while Barcelona were held to a 1-1 draw by Real Mallorca.

Second-placed Deportivo La Coruna kept up the pressure on Real and warmed up for their crucial European Champions League match against AC Milan with a 4-1 drubbing of Numancia on Saturday.

Real were irresistible as Vicente Del Bosque’s side put on a superb display for their former mentor, Sociedad’s Welsh coach John Toshack.

Fernando Morientes scored twice before Raul headed home the third from Portuguese star Luis Figo’s free-kick and English international Steve McManaman completed the scoring.

Raul’s goal rounded off an eventful week for the Spanish international, who will miss Real’s meaningless match against Anderlecht on Wednesday after being suspended for a game for using his hand to score in the 3-2 victory against Leeds United which guaranteed Real quarter-final qualificationToshack was convinced his former charges will take their 28th Spanish title.

Sociedad meanwhile are now third from bottom. Barcelona’s draw with Mallorca leaves them fourth, 11 points behind Real, and they appear to have lost any hope of the title or even second place.

Barcelona’s Brazilian midfielder Rivaldo scored for and against his team. He turned in a cross from Alberto Luque for an own goal in the 51st minute at the Nou Camp but rescued his side with a 74th-minute penalty won by Patrick Kluivert.

Valencia remained third after beating bottom club Osasana 1-0 on Saturday thanks to a Kily Gonzalez strike 13 minutes from time. But the performance of Saturday was Deportivo’s, Aswater Pandiani and Diego Tristan each bagged a brace of goals to outclass Numancia in the final 45 minutes.

The result was the perfect confidence-booster for Deportivo, who face a crunch clash with AC Milan at the San Siro tomorrow to decide which of the two teams goes through to the Champions League quarter-finals. Deportivo coach Javier Irureta will have been heartened that Pandiani and Tristan both got on the score-sheet again Saturday.

Pandiani had been his team’s hat-trick hero in the amazing 4-3 win over Paris Saint Germain in Europe last week, with tristan scoring the winner.