Cristiano Ronaldo grabbed his seventh hat-trick of the season as Real Madrid won the capital derby against Atletico 4-1 Wednesday.
Real Madrid saw their lead in Spain's La Liga cut to just four points after being held to a 0-0 draw by Valencia Sunday.
Football's version of the fabled David vs. Goliath battle will begin on Tuesday as Europe's top club competition kicks off its quarterfinal stage.
Real Madrid had two players and coach Jose Mourinho sent off as they were held to a 1-1 draw at Villarreal, offering hope to Barcelona in the race for the Spanish title.
An 'El Clasico' European Champions League final between Spanish giants Real Madrid and Barcelona remains a mouthwatering prospect after the teams were kept apart in the quarterfinal draw.
Branislav Ivanovic scored a superb extra-time goal to put Chelsea through to the quarterfinals of the European Champions League, while Real Madrid also progressed Wednesday.
Goal machine Cristiano Ronaldo scored twice as Real Madrid won 3-2 at Real Betis in the Spanish Primera Liga on Saturday -- their 11th victory in a row.
Real Madrid continued their ruthless charge towards the La Liga title with a 5-0 rout of Espanyol Sunday to maintain their 10-point lead at the top.
Cristiano Ronaldo scored the only goal of the match with a stunning backheel as Real Madrid beat Rayo Vallecano to stay 10 points clear in the Spanish title race Sunday.
A last-gasp goal from Swedish international midfielder Pontus Wernbloom saw CSKA Moscow earn a 1-1 Champions League last 16 home draw with Real Madrid on a freezing cold night in the Russian capital.
Barcelona survived a late onslaught from rivals Real Madrid to win their Spanish Cup quarterfinal tie 4-3 on aggregate and knock the holders out on Wednesday.
Real Madrid manager Jose Mourinho has rejected claims of dressing room unrest as the club prepare to face rivals Barcelona in Wednesday's second leg of their Spanish Cup quarterfinal tie.
Cristiano Ronaldo scored two penalties as Real Madrid beat ten-man Athletic Bilbao 4-1 to maintain their five-point lead over arch rivals Barcelona at the top of the Spanish league.
A late goal from Eric Abidal gave Barcelona a 2-1 comeback victory in the first leg of their Spanish Cup quarterfinal clash with arch rivals Real Madrid.
Jose Callejon scored a late winner for Real Madrid against Mallorca on Saturday evening as Jose Mourinho's men fought back from a goal down to defeat Mallorca 2-1 and extend their lead at the top of La Liga.
Barcelona came from behind to beat Osasuna 2-1 in the Spanish Cup on Thursday to secure a mouth-watering quarterfinal El Clasico clash with arch-rivals Real Madrid.
Holders Real Madrid progressed to the quarterfinals of the Spanish Cup after Tuesday's 1-0 win at Malaga sealed a 4-2 aggregate victory.
Real Madrid piled the pressure on Barcelona by moving six points clear at the top of Spain's La Liga with a 5-1 thrashing of Granada on Saturday.
Spanish league leaders Real Madrid came from two goals down to score a dramatic 3-2 home win over Malaga in Tuesday's Copa del Rey round of 16 first-leg tie.
Cristiano Ronaldo helped Real Madrid move three points clear in Spain ahead of the winter break with his fifth hat-trick this season in Saturday's 6-2 win at Sevilla, as both teams had a player sent off.
Shasta Darlington talks with Brazil's new Sports Minister Aldo Rebelo about preparations for the World Cup in 2014.
Barcelona ended Real Madrid's 15-match winning run to snatch back top spot in Spain's La Liga with a 3-1 "El Clasico" victory in the Santiago Bernabeu on Saturday.
This weekend sees a fixture which football fans across the world look forward to at the start of every season, with Spanish archrivals Real Madrid and Barcelona going head-to-head at the Bernabeu Stadium.
French side Lyon charged into the knockout stages of the European Champions League with a 7-1 rout of Dinamo Zagreb to go through in Group D behind all-conquering Real Madrid.
Real Madrid moved six points clear in Spain after winning a fiery derby match against nine-man Atletico on Saturday and then seeing defending champions Barcelona suffer a shock first La Liga defeat this season.
Twelve Champions League thoughts from Round 5 of the Group Stage:
Real Madrid made it five wins from five in Group D of the Champions League on Tuesday with a 6-2 rout of Dinamo Zagreb in the Santiago Bernabeu stadium.
Real Madrid's hopes of winning a first Spanish title since 2008 survived a stern test on Saturday, as Jose Mourinho marked his 50th La Liga match as coach with a tense 3-2 victory at third-placed Valencia.
There were contrasting fortunes for the two superstars of La Liga as Lionel Messi missed an injury time penalty for Barcelona in the Nou Camp to allow Real Madrid to go top as Cristiano Ronaldo grabbed a quickfire hat-trick.
Barcelona and Real Madrid have roared back to form ahead of next week's Champions League challenges, with the Spanish giants recording comfortable victories in La Liga on Saturday.
Spanish giants Barcelona and Real Madrid were both held in La Liga as they battled to unconvincing draws.
10-man Real Madrid slipped to a shock 1-0 defeat at Levante Sunday with a second half goal from Arouna Kone settling a scrappy match.
The new season started the way the old one ended: with Real Madrid and Barcelona taking center stage, eclipsing everyone else as they fought it out for a trophy. And by the end, "fought" was the word. Those who hoped that passions would have cooled over the summer were disappointed. The fact that the Super Copa is, to use Jose Mourinho's words, "the most important of the preseason games, the least important of the actual season games" made no difference. This was no friendly. How could it be?
So, Sergio Canales will play for Valencia for the whole of the next two seasons. Well, not the whole of them exactly. Canales has moved to Mestalla for two years. According to the agreement reached, Valencia will pay his wages for the two seasons and, at the end of each campaign, it will have a €12 million ($17M) option-to-buy. The other thing the agreement stipulates is that Canales will not be able to play against the club that owns him, Real Madrid. The crapping-yourself-clause strikes again.
FOXBOROUGH, Mass. -- It's not often U.S. fans get the opportunity to mingle in the presence of footballing royalty. So when adidas organized a meet-and-greet recently with nine members of the reigning World Cup champions in advance of Spain's recent friendly against the U.S., plenty were on hand at the "We Got Soccer" store to get a glimpse of Spain's stars up close and personal.
Barcelona eliminate rivals Real Madrid to reach the Champions League final. CNN's Al Goodman reports.
Camp Nou is routinely likened to a theater, but it actually hosts the latest instalment of an increasingly ridiculous soap opera when Real Madrid visit for the Champions League second leg. Since last week's "feisty" match, from which Barcelona leads 2-0, both teams have been charged by Uefa with various wrongdoings, and now Real has demanded that Barca boss Pep Guardiola and six of his players be penalized for "premeditated anti-sporting behavior." Naturally we can all assume we'll see exemplary behavior from representatives of both teams on Tuesday, and a jolly good match all round.
A Real Madrid fan tells CNN his thoughts on the semifinal clash.
This is the third of a rapid-fire quartet of clasicos thrown up by the fixture list, and a fascinating one it is too. Barcelona thrashed Real 5-0 earlier in the season and is comfortably considered the best team in the world, but Jose Mourinho has overseen a damaging couple of weeks for Barca's self-esteem. Real came back from behind to secure a 1-1 draw in La Liga, and last week lifted the Copa del Rey thanks to Cristiano Ronaldo's extra-time strike. Real's 6-3 thrashing of Valencia confirms Pep Guardiola's outfit as unfamiliar underdogs, with Andres Iniesta's absence through injury only reinforcing that.
He has become a familiar sight at Real Madrid¹s press conferences before its Champions League matches: next to the Special One sits the Silent One, a former player whose list of honors rivals that of the coach (it includes a World Cup and European Championship success), and whose presence adds even more stardust to the Real Madrid name.
Oops! Soccer champ drops trophy under a bus. CNN's Jeanne Moos has the greatest hits of trophy bloopers.
Real Madrid took the coveted 'King's Cup' on a ride to celebrate with fans and that's when things went horribly wrong.
Tactical observations from Champions League action this week:
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Last year, reaction to Real Madrid's decision to spend more than a quarter of a billion dollars, described by some as club president Florentino Perez's Galacticos 2.0 project, was mixed. There was no doubting the quality -- at least on paper -- of the new signings, from Cristiano Ronaldo to Xabi Alonso, from Kaka to Karim Benzema, without forgetting valuable "foot soldiers" like Raul Albiol, Alvaro Arbeloa and Esteban Granero. At the same time, the moralizers had a field day over the sheer amount of money spent while others weren't sure whether Manuel Pellegrini could meld all the big egos into a cohesive unit.
To most Americans, David Beckham is a soccer superstar. But to the rest of the world, he's pretty much an average professional footballer -- at least in terms of salary.
Be the one to represent your country! For more details or to upload your video, go to www.cnn.com/superfans
Atletico Madrid face second-bottom Valladolid Wednesday, the team that's won just six times all season, and it's Valladolid everyone expects to win. But Atletico doesn't mind. It expects Valladolid to win too -- and it won't be bursting any blood vessels to ensure otherwise.
iReporter and Arsenal fan from the U.S. Michael Parker offers his assessment of this season's Champions League.
It has been a weird summer of transfers. Most of Europe's top leagues kick off next month and yet, with a few exceptions (Real Madrid and, to a lesser degree, Juventus and Bayern Munich), there hasn't been too much going on. The window won't close until Aug. 31. In the meantime, here's an attempt at making sense of it all, with 11 questions facing 11 big clubs:
Return of the Galácticos. Galácticos Strike Back. Revenge of the Galácticos. Galácticos Part Deux.
Cristiano Ronaldo is unveiled at Real Madrid. World Sport's Pedro Pinto was among the 80,000 on hand.
First Kaka, now Ronaldo. The world's biggest club, Real Madrid, has gotten a whole lot bigger, as CNN's Jim Boulden reports.
Credit crunch and slow economy be damned, the soccer world is still spinning from the record-busting $131 million fee Real Madrid is on the verge of pumping into Manchester United's coffers for FIFA World Player of the Year Cristiano Ronaldo. That's on top of the $92 million the mysteriously loaded Spaniards already paid for last year's World Player of the Year, Kaká. But there's far more to come in the transfer market. This week, we run through the English Premier League looking at possible transfer targets, and who might be heading for the exit door.
Nine years ago, Florentino Pérez walked into the game and ushered in a new era. Call it "the Galáctico Age," call it "the Zidanes y Pavones experiment," call it the destruction of conventional wisdom, call it what you like.
It was Real Madrid's most humiliating European night in a long, long time. And in some ways, the 4-0 loss to Liverpool on Tuesday hurt more than the 5-0 defeat to Arrigo Sacchi's AC Milan team 20 years ago.
I've lost count of how many times I've heard friends and family whine to me about how foreign a sport soccer is. It's futile to get defensive because they're wrong and right at the same time.
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