It was the turn of Spain's Europa League sides midweek, and all three are on track for a place in the knock-out stage after victories all round. Villarreal and Athletic Bilbao are in fact already assured of going through, goals from Rossi and Marcos Senna giving the former a win at Levski Sofia, and Llorente on target twice as the latter beat Austria Vienna. Valencia still have a bit of work to do though in their last match at Genoa despite a 3-1 victory over Lille, Joaquín netting twice and Mata adding the third to take Unai Emery's side top of their group. On Wednesday night as well Barcelona beat Xerez 0-2 in a league game which was brought forward from day 15 due to Barça's participation in the Club world Cup, with Henry and Ibrahimovic the scorers.

Goals galore at the weekend, the 36 scored in the ten matches the highest since day 3. And 26 of those came in the second halves, which must be something off a record. On Saturday all four Champions League teams were in action, with Messi scoring two at Deportivo to lead Barcelona to victory the day before he picked up France Football's "Golden Ball" award as the best player in Europe this year. Ibrahimovic was also on the scoresheet to keep him one behind David Villa in the La Liga "Pichichi" race , the Valencia striker also scoring at Athletic Bilbao the following day. On an all competition basis Villa And Messi are level with Luis Fabiano after the Sevilla forward converted a penalty against Valladolid, although he is unlikely to figure again until the new year after picking up an injury.

On Saturday though we saw the "Cristiano Ronaldo Show", the Real Madrid forward making his reappearance in the Bernabeu against Almería after his injury, winning himself a penalty which Diego Alves saved (he was so upset he didn't even join in the goal celebrations after Benzema drove home the rebound), then scoring from Higuaín's assist before getting sent off for two yellow cards (see villains section for more on that). Higuaín himself had equalised earlier on. Before that Atlético Madrid had beaten Xerez 0-2, with Diego Forlán and Agüero once again the goalscorers. And the following day there were 22 goals more, with Aduríz getting the first two for Mallorca in a 4-1 win over Zaragoza, and Soldado converting a penalty as Getafe lost 3-2 at Villarreal. Quite a weekend! (07.12.09)