Becks and Gravesen see red as Real lose at home

ENGLAND captain David Beckham and Thomas Gravesen were both sent off as Real Madrid slipped to a 2-1 defeat at home to Valencia last night.

Rubén Baraja opened the scoring for Valencia on 21 minutes and though Raul equalised 14 minutes later, the visitors were back in front before the break thanks to David Villa’s strike.

Beckham was dismissed three minutes from time for applauding referee Arturo Dauden Ibañez’s decision to book him. Sound familiar? Real, instead of going top, are now third in the table, two points behind Getafe.

On Saturday the leaders bounced back after losing their unbeaten record last week with a comprehensive 5-2 defeat of Real Zaragoza while Malaga hammered Real Betis 5-0 to hand the Seville-based side their worst league defeat for 22 years.

Salva Ballesta (2) Fernando Sanz and Pablo Counago (2) were all on target.

Villarreal have yet to do better than a draw in their Champions League group matches but three first half goals sufficed for a comfortable 3-0 win over bottom club Real Mallorca. Juan Roman Riquelme, Jose Mari Romero and Diego Forlan each grabbed a goal for Villarreal.

Two efforts from Samuel Eto’o and one from his replacement Ludovic Giuly helped Barcelona to a 3-0 win over Osasuna in Saturday’s other game.

In Italy last night, Roma and Lazio played out a 1-1 draw in an ill-tempered Rome derby. Francesco Totti put Roma ahead on 40 minutes but Tommaso Rocchi produced a brilliant header to equalise half an hour from time. Lazio are now eight and Roma 14th in Serie A. Earlier Juventus won 3-0 at Lecce to maintain their 100% league record and equal the best ever start to a season.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic’s first league goal gave Juve an early lead before late strikes from Adrian Mutu and Marcelo Zalayeta sealed an eighth consecutive victory for the reigning Italian champions.

The record for the best start already belonged to the Turin club whose teams of the 1930-31 and 1985-86 seasons each won eight games in a row. Both of those sides went on to win the championship.

Juve, beaten 2-1 at Bayern Munich in the Champions League on Tuesday, have 24 points, five more than title rivals AC Milan who came from behind to beat Palermo 2-1.

Filippo Inzaghi, whose career has been blighted by injuries, scored the winner at the San Siro with his first goal in Serie A since March 24, 2004.

Julio Cruz, a 30th minute substitute for the injured Adriano, scored the only goal as Inter Milan won 1-0 at Udinese to stay a point behind Milan.

In Germany, Piotr Trochowski scored a late equaliser to salvage Hamburg SV a 1-1 draw at Borussia Dortmund and strengthen the north German side’s hold on third place in the Bundesliga yesterday.

Hamburg are third in the table with 21 points from 10 matches, three points clear of fourth-placed Schalke. Leaders Bayern, who crushed MSV Duisburg 4-0 on Saturday, are top with 25 points, two clear of Werder Bremen who drew 0-0 at Hanover 96 on Saturday.

Across the border in Holland, Timmy Simons converted a disputed penalty in the 10th minute to hand PSV Eindhoven a 1-0 victory over Ajax Amsterdam in the Dutch first division.

PSV moved top with 22 points from nine matches.