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Robben steals pair of goals

TABLE-TOPPERS BayernMunich continued to rollthrough German football’s top leaguewith acomfortable victory at Eintracht Braunschweig onSaturday, while chasers Bayer Levekusen andBorussia Dortmund both kept pacewithwins. ArjenRobben scored two goals for Bayern, who have 38points after extending their record undefeated streakto 39matcheswith a 2-0 victory over last-placedBraunschweig, who had their share of chances.

Lille, Monaco keeping pace

LILLE andMonaco kept the pressure on high-flyingParis Saint-Germain on Saturday as bothwon theirLigue 1matches to keep pacewith the champions. Asecond-half Ronny Rodelin goal lifted Lille to a 1-0success at Valenciennes after Monaco had earlierclaimed a 2-0win over Rennes. Lille are now just onepoint behind PSG. Lille held third-from-bottomValenciennes at bay as they playedwith 10menfollowing Franck Beria’s sending-off.

Premier Leaguematch-fix plea

PREMIER League chief executive Richard Scudamoreon Saturday urged anyonewith information aboutmatch-fixing in the English top flight to report thematter to police. Hewas responding to a claim by anonline betting expert that two Premier Leaguematches since 2000 have shown signs of suspiciousbetting patterns. Twomen suspected of fixingmatches in lower-league English football wereremanded in custody bymagistrates on Friday.

Arsenal’s Welsh midfielder Aaron Ramsey, a former Cardiff City player, scores the third goal of his side’s 3-0 victory over his former club at Cardiff Picture: AFP

Welsh wizard nails two

SOCCER

EPL

He can attack,

defend, and he

scores goals

ARSENAL manager ArseneWenger was left feeling hisage after Aaron Ramseyscored twice against his for-mer club Cardiff City tostretch his side’s lead in thePremier League.

Ramsey, a Cardiff academygraduate, scored with a 29th-minute header andan injury-time drive, eitherside of an 86th-minute Math-ieu Flamini strike, in a 3-0win at the Cardiff CityStadium on Saturday.

Victory left Arsenal seven

points above their nearestrivals ahead of Sunday’s fix-tures and Wenger was onceagain indebted to 22-year-oldRamsey, who has scored 13goals in all competitions forhis club this season.

‘‘He has matured as a

player and a person,’’ saidWenger. ‘‘I was a midfieldplayer and I would have lovedto have had what he has. Hecan attack, defend, and hescores goals. He is also young,which is not a quality I have.

‘‘I think he can still de-velop. He has developed somuch over the past threeyears, so why stop now? If hecontinues to play like that, hehas a good future.’’

Ramsey cost Arsenal £5million ($A9 million) when hesigned from Cardiff at 17 andWenger refused to counten-ance how much it would takefor the club to sell him.

‘‘It was a good price at thetime,’’ Wenger said.

‘‘But we have to put thatinto perspective a little bit be-cause the prices have goneup. As far as selling, we don’twant to sell anyone. We wantto keep our team together.’’

Wenger described Ram-sey’s opening goal, scoredfrom a Mesut Ozil cross, as ‘‘avery convincing header’’,while the Welshman’s secondeffort was an emphatic finishset up by substituteTheo Walcott.

Ramsey did not celebrateeither effort and his actionsdrew a standing ovation from

large sections of the homecrowd after the first goal.

‘‘I thought that was fantas-tic,’’ Wenger said.

‘‘I have a lot of respect forthat and I would like to see itmore often.’’

Ramsey was delighted bythe reception he was affordedon his return to Cardiff.

‘‘They were really respect-ful and I gave them my re-spect too by not celebrating,’’he said.

The win elevated Wenger’sside seven points above near-est rivals Liverpool and Chel-sea, as well as Everton, whoclimbed to fourth place by

beating Stoke City. On-loanBarcelona youngster GerardDeulofeu produced a dazzlingindividual display as Evertoncrushed Stoke 4-0.

Newcastle United ended theday a point behind Everton infifth after Moussa Sissokoscored a spectacular 25m win-ner in a 2-1 victory at home toWest Bromwich Albion.

Elsewhere, Tony Pulis’sfirst game as Crystal Palacemanager ended in a 1-0 defeatat Norwich City whileSunder-land’s Emanuele Giaccherinimissed a sitter and FabioBorini hit the bar in a 0-0draw at Aston Villa.

Bale nets hat-trickGARETH Bale took his tallyto eight goals in his pastseven games with ahat-trick as Real Madridshrugged off the loss ofCristiano Ronaldo to beatValladolid 4-0.

With the Portuguese starsidelined by a slight musclestrain, Bale proved to be de-cisive as he headed homethe opener after DiegoMarino could only parryAngel di Maria’s cross.

Three minutes later theWelshman teed up KarimBenzema to double Madrid’slead with a wonderful in-swinging cross that theFrenchman bulleted home.

Bale grabbed his second ofthe game when Carlos Penacould only turn Marcelo’scross into the path of thegrateful former Tottenhamman to slot home.

Bale completed his firsthat-trick in Spanish footballwith a simple left-footed fin-ish a minute from time.

Victory moved Real towithin three points ofleaders Barcelona and At-letico Madrid, who werealso 2-0 victors over Elcheon Saturday.

Bale said he did not feelpressured without Ronaldo,but was desperate to seal hisfirst Madrid hat-trick.

Rangers leave it lateFALLEN giants Rangersneeded two late goals to booktheir place in the last 16 of theScottish Cup with a 2-0 vic-tory over 10-man Falkirk.

Rangers had the best of thefirst half chances but lacked akiller touch in front of goal.

Sixteen of Rangers’ past 19goals have come in the secondhalf and the restart signalleda bombardment of the Falkirkgoal with Jon Daly headingan effort over the bar beforeLee Wallace fired just wide.

The League One side had agreat chance to make thebreakthrough when Falkirkwere reduced to 10 men in the57th minute. David McCrack-

en was shown a straight redcard after he clipped the heelsof Nicky Clark as he chaseddown a Daly headed flick-onin the box.

Michael McGovern savedLee McCulloch’s penalty withhis feet and the Rangers skip-per’s follow-up was ruled outfor offside.

The match looked headingto a replay before Nicky Lawgave Rangers a deserved leadin the 89th minute lead off IanBlack’s free kick.

Mark Millar had a latechance to grab an equaliserbefore David Templetonsealed the win with a goal twominutes into stoppage time.

Foxes far too cageyLEICESTER surged to thetop of English football’ssecond-tier Championshipwith a 3-0 win over strug-gling Millwall on Saturday.

Nigel Pearson’s side start-ed the day in third place, butthey took full advantage ofdefeats for previous leadersBurnley, who lost 2-1 at Hud-dersfield, and second-placedQPR, beaten 2-1 by Doncas-ter, to boost their challengefor promotion to the Prem-ier League.

The Foxes were always incontrol against the lack-lustre Lions at the KingPower Stadium, with LloydDyer taking 12 minutes to

open the scoring with a vol-leyed finish.

Leicester were well ontheir way to their 12th win ofthe season when JamieVardy ran more than half thelength of the pitch from acleared Millwall corner toslot home in the 52nd minute.

Vardy netted again threeminutes later, capitalisingon a wayward back headerfrom Millwall defenderScott Malone.

That was more thanenough to seal the win andLeicester are now threepoints clear at the top, whileMillwall are only one placeabove the relegation zone.