Madrid beat Valencia but Benzema off injured

MADRID: Real Madrid reduced Barcelona’s LaLiga lead to five points with a 2-0 win over Valencia on Thursday, thanks to spectacular goals from Marco Asensio and Vinicius Junior.

The duo struck in a three-minute second-half salvo which stunned the visitors at the Santiago Bernabeu, and Valencia were later reduced to 10 men when Gabriel Paulista took a wild hack at Vinicius.

Madrid dominated throughout but an otherwise good night was tainted when captain Karim Benzema went off injured in the second half with an apparent thigh problem, and Eder Militao was also replaced for a similar reason.