• Barcelona 7-0 Osasuna
• Messi reaches 371 goals, surpassing Paulino Alcántara
Lionel Messi hit a hat-trick to surpass Paulino Alcántara’s record of 369 goals for Barcelona, as they warmed up for the Clásico with Real Madrid next weekend with a 7-0 victory over Osasuna that put them four points off the top of La Liga.
Barça knocked Manchester City out of the Champions League last Wednesday but went into the Osasuna clash on the back of two defeats from their past three league games. The Argentinian struck the opener after 18 minutes in a morale boosting victory for the Catalan side before the crunch game at the Bernabéu. Alexis Sánchez pounced to double the lead after 22 minutes and Andrés Iniesta hit a fine left-footed drive from 20 yards with little over half an hour gone.
Chances continued to come and go before Messi bagged another with a shot into the roof of the net from close range just after the hour before the substitute Cristian Tello scored with a powerful shot. Messi was given time in the area to add his third late on, his 18th of the season, and then he set-up Pedro to complete the rout in stoppage time.
The Brazilian Neymar was a surprise absentee from the starting line-up in a win that left Barça on 66 points from 28 matches, four behind Real and one behind Atlético Madrid who beat Espanyol 1-0 on Saturday.
Real Sociedad boosted their Champions League hopes as Imanol Agirretxe gave them a 1-0 win over Valencia which put them in fifth on 46 points.
It was their first win in three attempts and Valencia had more of the ball but they were missing their in-form striker Paco Alcacer through suspension and struggled to create chances.
Jonas did shoot wide for the visitors before the break but Agirretxe flicked a header into the top corner on the hour mark and Antoine Griezmann wasted the chance to give them a more comfortable win as he was denied by Diego Alves when through on goal.
Elsewhere Sevilla beat Valladolid 4-1 while Elche and Real Betis drew 0-0.





