体坛英语新闻：Bilbao on song as final Cup places decided in Spain

MADRID, Dec. 19 (Xinhua) -- Athletic Club Bilbao came back from a 1-0 first leg defeat to book their place in the last 16 of the Copa del Rey knockout competition with a convincing 4-0 win at home over Celta Vigo on Thursday.

Although they knew a goal from their visitors would mean they needed to score three goals, the Basque side, who are currently fourth in the BBVA Primera Liga produced a confident display to dominate the game almost from start to finish and with some better finishing they would have enjoyed an even bigger margin of victory.

Iker Muniain opened the scoring and leveled the tie with a lovely curling shot in the 22nd minute and Markel Susaeta's goal in the last minute of the first half put the home side ahead on aggregate.

Athletic totally dominated the second half, but it was not until the 80th minute that Muniain made the tie safe and Aduriz added a fourth goal five minutes from time to seal another fine display from Athletic, who had Ibai Gomez, Ander Iturraspe and Muniain as their stars.

Rayo Vallecano were able to forget their problems in the league as two goals from Adrian Gonzalez and a smart finish from Alberto Bueno saw them come back from 1-0 down to beat Valladolid 3-1.

Javi Guerra, who scored a hat-trick at the weekend, had put Valladolid ahead as the first leg ended 0-0, but Rayo's constant attacks were rewarded with a place in the last 16.

Valencia, who sacked coach Miroslav Djukic on Monday, turned in a grey performance as they beat Gimnastic Tarragona 1-0 in the Mestalla Stadium.

Paco Alcacer scored the only goal of the game and it would have been a greater margin of victory had Helder Postiga, who has not scored since Sept. 1, not seen a penalty saved two minutes from time and Valencia keeper, Vicente Guaita was forced to make a good save in the last minute of injury time to keep his side in the competition.

Espanyol had fewer problems in beating Jaen 2-0 on the night to qualify 4-2 on aggregate against the second division side.

Simao Sabrosa and central defender Sidnei Rechel scored the goals to book the Barcelona based side a place in the next round.

Tuesday and Wednesday saw Cup holders Atletico Madrid qualify comfortably for the next round, along with Real Madrid and FC Barcelona and the vast majority of the side's from the BBVA Primera Liga.

There were two surprises as Sevilla were beaten 2-0 at home to third tier, Racing Santander to crash out 2-1 on aggregate, while Alcorcon won 2-0 in Granada to make their tie 2-2 on aggregate before then knocking the top flight out on penalties.