Titles races across the continent continued to heat up over the weekend with some important results in all the major leagues.
Madrid and Barca still slugging for supremacy, while Milan maintain lead
Titles races across the continent continued to heat up over the weekend with some important results in all the major leagues.
Heavyweight rivals Real Madrid and Barcelona traded blows again in the Spanish title race with vital victories.
Leaders AC Milan, Borussia Dortmund and AZ Alkmaar all triumphed in their respective divisions, but big-spending Paris St Germain slipped up.
Primera Liga
Real Madrid maintained their six-point lead with a
comfortable 5-1 win against Real Sociedad thanks to braces from Cristiano Ronaldo and Karim Benzema, Gonzalo Higuain adding the other.
Barca overcame Thiago Alcantara's sending-off to beat Real Mallorca 2-0 through Lionel Messi and Gerard Pique.
The battle for European places
intensified with Malaga strengthening their grip on fourth place after a 2-1 comeback success at Espanyol and sixth-placed Osasuna's 2-0 win at Levante, the team directly above them.
Serie A
Reigning champions AC Milan
came back from behind with a Zlatan Ibrahimovic brace to beat Roma 2-1 and open up a seven-point lead over second-placed Juventus.
But they were
pegged back to four points within 24 hours as goals from Martin Caceres and Alessandro Del Piero helped Juve beat Milan's city rivals Inter in a 2-0 win.
Third-placed Lazio won 1-0 against Cagliari as nearest rivals Napoli and Udinese could only manage draws.
Bundesliga
Frontrunners Borussia Dortmund
ran riot with five second-half goals in a 6-1 triumph at Cologne.
Milivoje Novakovic put the hosts ahead before Lukasz Piszczek, Shinji Kagawa (2), Robert Lewandowski, Ilkay Gundogan and Ivan Perisic turned the tables.
Nearest challengers Bayern Munich had previously
reduced their advantage to just two points after Toni Kroos and Mario Gomez clinched a 2-1 win against Hannover.
Relegation-threatened Freiburg climbed out of the drop zone by securing a priceless 2-0 win over bottom side Kaiserslautern.
Ligue 1
Stuttering Paris St Germain failed to
reclaim top spot from title rivals Montpellier after labouring to a 1-1 home draw against Bordeaux.
Guillaume Hoarau grabbed a late equaliser for Carlo Ancelotti's men but Montpellier remain in front on goal difference following Oliver Giroud's
late winner against St Etienne.
Reigning champions Lille are seven points adrift after beating Evian, while bottom club Auxerre's defeat by Toulouse means they are still searching for their first win of 2012.
Eredivisie
AZ Alkmaar made hard work of RKC Waalwijk before Icelandic forward Johann Berg Gudmundsson pounced for the
only goal of the game to keep them top.
Second-placed Ajax beat fellow challengers PSV Eindhoven with goals from Ismail Aissati and Siem de Jong to earn themselves some breathing space from their fourth-placed opponents.
Steve McClaren's FC Twente, who occupy third,
missed the chance to momentarily move above Alkmaar when they were held 1-1 at lowly Den Haag.
Best of the rest
Portuguese Liga table-toppers Porto blew the chance to go three points clear of Benfica after a 1-1 draw at Pacos Ferreira.
Galatasaray drew 1-1 with third-placed Trabzonspor, but still remain seven points ahead of second place Fenerbahce in the Turkish Super Lig.
