MADRID, Feb. 17 (Xinhua) -- Real Madrid's hopes of winning this season's La Liga Santander title suffered a serious and surprising setback on Sunday as they were beaten 2-1 at home by struggling Girona.

Real Madrid went into the game in their best form of the season with five successive league wins, while Girona had sunk to fourth from bottom of the table without a win in 10 games, however, the visitors took advantage of a disastrous second half from Madrid to claim all three points.

Casemiro headed Madrid into a 24th minute lead, but Cristhian Stauni, equalized for Girona with a 65th minute penalty after Sergio Ramos handballed, and Portu, who had earlier hit the crossbar, gave the visitors a shock win with a 74th minute header after Anthony Lozano had hit the post.

Madrid ended with Mariano Diaz, Gareth Bale, Karim Benzema and Vinicius Jr. on the pitch but unable to find an equalizer, meaning they have slipped back to third in the table, nine points behind Barca and one behind Atletico Madrid.

Both Barca and Atletico Madrid had both won on Saturday, but neither were convincing in their 1-0 wins.

A Leo Messi penalty close to the end of the first half gave 3 points at home to Valladolid just 24 hours after Barca coach Ernesto Valverde had signed a new contract with the club.

Barca struggled to make chances against a well-organized rival and looked to again be lacking sharpness, although Messi did waste a chance to double their lead in the closing minutes when his second penalty of the match was saved by Valladolid keeper Jordi Masip.

Atletico again had Antoine Griezmann to thank for their three points as the Frenchman's deflected close range effort saw them home away to struggling Rayo Vallecano.

Perhaps the big positive for Atletico was Diego Costas return to action after a long term injury ahead of their Champions League tie against Juventus.

Chinese striker Wu Lei made his first start with Espanyol in their visit to Valencia in a game which ended 0-0 with the visitors seeing defender Javi Lopez sent off in the closing minutes.

Villarreal won their first league game after 11 attempts as they beat Sevilla 3-0 in the Estadio de la Ceramica.

The home side took advantage of Sevilla's poor form in 2019 with goals from Alvaro Gonzalez, Karlo Toko Ekambi and Alfonso Pedraza to give themselves a chance of avoiding relegation.

Celta coach Miguel Cardoso must be in danger of losing his job after his side were thrashed 4-1 at home to Levante, who climb away from the danger zone thanks to two goals from Jose Luis Morales and further strikes from Coke and Borja Mayoral.

Real Sociedad are knocking on the door of the top-six after two goals from Mikel Oyarzabal (his 7th and 8th of the season) and one from Willian Jose saw them to a 3-0 win at home to Leganes, with all the goals coming in the second half.

Betis and Alaves drew 1-1 in another game between two teams with European aspirations that leaves Alaves sixth in the table after Guillermo Maripan cancelled out Giovani Lo Celso Betis' 15th minute opener for the home side.

Friday night saw Eibar striker, Charles score twice to give his side a point at home to Getafe, who had led 2-0 in the Basque Country through Javier Mata and Dimitri Foulquier. Enditem

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