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Eighteen round matches of the 23rd round of the Spanish Championship took place on Sunday. No major surprises were recorded, and the favorites achieved victories, including Madrid's "Real", securing their seventh consecutive win, while "Sevilla" won the battle for third place. "Real" had to struggle away from home and was trailing after the 36th minute following a goal by "Osasuna" from Pamplona, but as the match neared its end, the visitors snatched a victory, scoring both goals with repeat attempts after the goalkeeper deflected the ball back into play following penalty kicks. "Sevilla" climbed to third place, defeating "Villarreal" in the duel for third place with two goals from J.Baptista, for whom this defeat was the first after a series of five successful matches. With "Valencia" dropping to fourth place in terms, "Espanyol" tied with them, winning over "Getafe" in the final minutes, as did "Betis" after a goal-finishing eight-goal match with Bilbao "Athletic". By the way, the latter match was the second time in three weeks that "Athletic" managed to recover from conceding three goals and later scored four, though the Basques conceded another in this match. "Mallorca" and "Malaga" teams secured important wins, respectively beating "Albacete" and "Numancia" in the matches of the outsiders. "Real Sociedad" won away against Santander's "Racing", while the "Atletico" and "Levante" matches ended goalless.
Sunday's match statistics 2 - 1 36' [1 - 0] Cesar Julio Baptista 82' [2 - 0] Cesar Julio Baptista (penalty) 88' [2 - 1] Juan Roman Riquelme (penalty) 85' Aitor Ocio ("Sevilla") sent off 1 - 3 8' [0 - 1] Mikel Aranburu 10' [0 - 2] Nihat Kahveci 35' [0 - 3] Nihat Kahveci 57' [1 - 3] Anderson Silva 0 - 1 44' [0 - 1] Antonio Juan Rodriguez 32' L.Tevenet ("Malaga") sent off 2 - 1 27' [0 - 1] Mark Gonzalez 52' [1 - 1] Antoni Tuni 72' [2 - 1] Luis Garcia Fernandez (penalty) 2 - 0 90' [1 - 0] Antonio Soldevilla 90' [2 - 0] Raul Tamudo (penalty) 90' J.S. Broto ("Getafe") sent off 0 - 0 17' J.A. Culebras ("Levante") sent off 1 - 2 36' [1 - 0] Pierre Webo 76' [1 - 1] Michael Owen 79' [1 - 2] Ivan Helguera 4 - 4 4' [0 - 1] Ricardo Oliveira 11' [0 - 2] Joaquin Sanchez 24' [0 - 3] Ricardo Oliveira 31' [1 - 3] Ismael Urzaiz 34' [2 - 3] Ismael Urzaiz 47' [3 - 3] Carlos Gurpegi 69' [4 - 3] Francisco Yeste 80' [4 - 4] Ricardo Oliveira 74' A.Lembo ("Betis") sent off
