Barcelona, Juventus and Schalke all won the first legs of their UEFA Champions League qualifiers.
Barca and Juve both record convincing wins
Barcelona, Juventus and Schalke all won the first legs of their UEFA Champions League third round qualifiers.
Barcelona will travel to Poland for the second leg of their tie against
Wisla Krakow with a 4-0 advantage following a convincing win at Camp Nou.
Samuel Eto'o opened the scoring for Barcelona, who reached the semi-finals last season before losing to eventual champions Manchester United.
The Cameroon international's goal came after 17 minutes and the crowd did not have to wait long for a second as Xavi struck on 24 minutes.
Thierry Henry scored a third after 54 minutes and Eto'o made sure of the victory on 84 minutes.
Juventus, out of Europe for the last two seasons following their involvement in the Italian match-fixing scandal, all but clinched their place in the group stages as they crushed Slovakian outfit
Artmedia Bratislava 4-0 in Turin.
Much of the damage was done in the first half as Mauro Camoranesi (7), Alessandro Del Piero (26) and Giorgio Chiellini (39) all found the target.
Nicola Legrottaglie then added a fourth in the 90th minute to complete the rout and set up a straightforward second leg in Bratislava.
Perhaps the most intriguing clash of the night pitted Bundesliga side
Schalke against
Atletico Madrid of Spain.
And it was the Germans who came out on top in the first leg as they battled to a 1-0 victory at home.
Christian Pander was the match-winner for Schalke with a goal on 30 minutes, while Atletico's Antonio Lopez was sent off 14 minutes from time.
Kiev cruise
Marseille took charge of their tie against
SK Brann with a 1-0 victory in Norway.
Benoit Cheyrou grabbed the only goal of the game five minutes before half-time to make the French side firm favourites to progress to the group stages.
Dynamo Kiev have one foot in the Champions League group stages following their 4-1 win away to
Spartak Moscow.
The Russian side made an ideal start to their third qualifying round, first leg, tie at the Luzhniki Stadium when Nikita Bazhenov fired them in front in only the fourth minute.
But Kiev responded strongly and Ismael Bangoura (28) got them back on level terms before Artem Milevski struck just before the interval.
Spartak were still reeling from that blow when Bangoura made it 3-1 seconds after the re-start with Milevski adding a fourth five minutes from time.
Anorthosis Famagusta are another side who already have one eye on the next phase following their impressive 3-0 victory over
Olympiakos.
The Cypriot side were handed the advantage by their Greek opponents in only the fifth minute when Vassilis Torossidis put through his own net.
Lukasz Sosin doubled the home team's advantage in the 19th minute with Vincent Laban's late third giving Anorthosis an added cushion ahead of the second leg.
Panathinaikos also look set to advance in the competition after beating
Sparta Prague 2-1 in Czech Republic.
A Stepan Kucera own goal put Pana on course for victory in the 24th minute, before Marek Kulic equalised six minutes later.
Simao struck for Panathinaikos on 59 minutes to give them a lead to take back to Greece.
Kaunas struggle
The tie between
Partizan Belgrade and
Fenerbahce is finely poised at the halfway point after a 2-2 draw in Serbia.
Partizan made a flying start with Paunovic and Milos Bogunovic both netting inside the opening 14 minutes.
However, Luis Aragones' side pulled one goal back through Alex's penalty on the stoke of half-time, and Daniel Guiza then levelled five minutes into the second half.
Rangers' conquerors
FBK Kaunas look to be heading out of the competition after going down 2-0 away to
AAB Aalborg.
Kaunas frustrated the Danish side, who are managed by Bruce Rioch, until substitute Lucas Caca broke the deadlock in the 71st minute, with Jeppe Curth adding a second four minutes from time.
Two goals from former Blackburn striker Shabani Nonda helped
Galatasaray come from 2-0 down to draw with
Steaua Bucharest in Turkey.
The visitors raced into an early lead with Dayro Moreno (4) and Banel Nicolita (12) on target to claim two crucial away goals.
But Nonda hit back almost immediately to reduce the arrears, before hitting the equaliser just two minutes into the second half.
Shakhtar Donetsk scored twice in the first half to take control of their qualifying clash against
Dinamo Zagreb.
Defender Darijo Srna opened the scoring with just three minutes on the clock before Evaeyerson Brandau grabbed a second just after the half-hour mark.
Belarussian outfit
BATE Borisov returned from Bulgaria with an important 1-0 victory over
Levski Sofia, with Vladimir Rzhevskiy scoring the only goal of the game in the 60th minute.
The home side were left to rue Georgi Ivanov's spot kick miss, when he failed to find the target after being fouled by goalkeeper Sergei Veremko in the first half.
In the final game of the night,
Guimares of Portugal played out a goalless draw against Swiss side
Basel.
