Benzema, Asensio seal Madrid Derby win
Karim Benzema and Marco Asensio struck as Real Madrid strengthened its position at the LaLiga summit with a 2-0 win over Atletico Madrid.
LaLiga leader Real Madrid moved 13 points clear of rival Atletico Madrid after a 2-0 El Derbi win at the Santiago Bernabeu.
Karim Benzema got Madrid on its way with a fine volley early on, before he was replaced at the interval by Luka Jovic after appearing to suffer a reoccurrence of a recent hamstring injury.
Marco Asensio ensured Atleti's winless run against Los Blancos stretched to eight games – its longest such run under Diego Simeone – with a second in the 57th minute.
The victory meant Carlo Ancelotti's men moved eight points clear of second-placed Sevilla, which has a game in hand, while Atleti is well off the pace in fourth.
Los Blancos went ahead in the 16th minute when Benzema superbly volleyed past Jan Oblak from Vinicius Junior's lofted cross for his 13th league goal of the season.
That was the France international's third goal in his last four appearances against Atleti in all competitions – just one fewer than in his previous 34 games against it.
Atleti offered little in the way of attacking threat during a tepid first half, yet came close to a leveller 10 minutes before the interval when Antoine Griezmann's free-kick was pawed away by Thibaut Courtois at full stretch.
Courtois denied half-time substitute Joao Felix and Matheus Cunha early in the second half, before Asensio whipped into Oblak's bottom-right corner from 15 yards after he was picked out by Vinicius' pass.
Joao Felix volleyed into Courtois’s face in stoppage time as the defending champion was unable to peg back its city rival.
