First Division - Day 18

Barcelona 4 - Sevilla 0

Barcelona: Víctor Valdés; Dani Alves, Puyol (Márquez 46'), Piqué, Abidal; Xavi, Busquets, Iniesta (Bojan 86'); Messi, Ibrahimovic, Henry (Pedro 63'). 4-3-3.
Sevilla: Palop; Konko (Adriano 58'), Escudé, Dragutinovic, Fernando Navarro; Lolo, Marc Valiente (Duscher 46'); Stankevicius, Jesús Navas, José Carlos (Diego Capel 46'); Koné. 4-2-3-1.

Goals:
1-0. 49. Escudé (own goal). Deflected Piqué's off-target shot past Palop.
2-0. 70. Pedro. Ran on to Xavi through ball to lift shot past keeper.
3-0. 85. Messi. Controlled Dani Alves's cross and shot wide of Palop.
4-0. 91. Messi. Picked up Abidal pass and ran on to clip shot in to net.

Yellow cards: Marc Valiente 35', Navarro 54', Busquets 63', Duscher 74'.

Barcelona took their revenge for their midweek elimination from the cup, a 4-0 win over Sevilla taking them five points clear at the top of the table. With a quarter final tie coming up next week, Manolo Jiménez put out a depleted side. But somehow they held on to half time, Palop making a couple of important saves from Henry and Messi and Ibrahimovic and Alves both failing to find the target.

Jimenez made two changes at the break to bring on first choice Duscher and Capel, and Koné almost made the breakthrough. But a few minutes later the locals took the lead, Piqué's effort from Márquez's cross going wide before Escudé turned it in to his own net.

Palop made a couple more top class saves from Messi and Henry, but he was beaten for a second time when substitute Pedro ran on to a defence splitting pass from Xavi to lift the ball over the keeper.

After that Messi took over to deliver the killer blows, collecting a lobbed pass from Alves to score his 100th goal in a Barcelona shirt, and then running on to Abidal's pass to clip the ball past Palop again.

Real Madrid's defeat earlier in the evening means that Guardiola's side are assured the honorary title of winter champions, and if they can avoid defeat at Valladolid next weekend they will end the first half of the league season without losing a match.