Report: Real Madrid 2-0 Valencia
Karim Benzema maintained his impressive scoring run against Valencia and Toni Kroos was also on target as Real Madrid eased to a 2-0 win in Sunday’s LaLiga clash.
French striker Benzema netted for the fifth league game running in this fixture to open the scoring at Estadio Alfredo Di Stefano and Kroos added a second before half-time.
Valencia won the reverse fixture 4-1 in November, with Carlos Soler scoring a hat-trick of penalties, but they offered little attacking threat in a one-sided game in the Spanish capital.
Ferland Mendy had a goal ruled out in a low-key second half as Madrid, who lost Dani Carvajal to an injury on his return to action, made it three league wins in a row to move back into second place.
Valencia were seeking a first league double over Madrid since 1967-68 but found themselves behind to Benzema’s 12th-minute strike.
Kroos played the ball to Benzema towards the left and the striker cut inside before curling a 20-yard shot into the bottom-right corner.
Losing Carvajal to an injury was a blow for the hosts but they did not lose any fluency as Kroos fired in from the edge of the box for only his second goal this season.
Valencia, now without an away league win against Madrid in 13 attempts, pressed for an equaliser and called Thibaut Courtois into action through a Maxi Gomez drive.
Mendy had the ball in the net soon after, only for his celebrations to be cut short as VAR adjudged the defender’s heel to be offside before he converted Vinicius Junior’s pass.
Zinedine Zidane’s men went close to adding to their tally, but Jaume Domenech denied Benzema at his near post and Mendy lost his footing when shooting from a good position late on.
