10 man Barcelona kept the title challenge alive after beating Getafe 1-0 at the Camp Nou. Barça took the lead early on through Ronaldinho but were reduced to 10 men before half-time when Ronaldinho was sent off for lashing out at Getafe's David Belenguer.

Barça went into the game knowing only a victory would do after Real Madrid had earlier disposed of Deportivo La Coruña 3-1 at the Santiago Bernabeú.

It didn't take very long for Barça to put Getafe to the sword, Lionel Messi feeding Samuel Eto'o, who skipped past two Getafe defenders and squared for the unmarked Ronaldinho to fire into the empty net and give Barça the lead inside the first two minutes.

10 minutes later, Ronaldinho nearly sealed the points but his powerful freekick could only be palmed over by Roberto Abbondanzieri in the Getafe goal.

In the 22nd minutes, Lionel Messi should have been awarded a penalty after a push by Ruben Pulido, but the man in the middle, Alfonso Perez Burrull, waved play on, much to the annoyance of the home crowd.

After a lull in proceedings, captain Carles Puyol should have doubled Barcelona's lead ten minutes later when he sent a header just wide of the far post from Deco's free-kick.

Eto'o then tested Abbondanzieri in the Getafe goal with a powerful effort on 33 minutes as Barça continued to dominate.

However, things took a turn for the worst on 39 minutes when goalscorer Ronaldinho was sent off after he kicked out Getafe's David Belenguer. The sending off was deserved but Belenguer deserved to be off as well after he was caught kicking the Barça number 10 at least 3 times in the build up to the incident.

Second half report to follow............