AFP - Villarreal made it eight league wins from nine at home defeating lowly Almeria 2-0 at El Madrigal on Monday to move five points clear of fourth-placed Valencia.
Centre-back Jose Catala finished off a Borja Valero set-piece on 22 minutes and Valero curled in a 58th free-kick to get himself on the scoresheet to seal a win that keeps them nestled in third, five points behind second-placed Real Madrid.
Almeria, who have scored just five goals on the road, fall to second from bottom, two points from safety.
Villarreal have a challenging week ahead of them facing Valencia on Thursday in the last 16 of the Kings Cup and then travelling to Real Madrid at the weekend for a crunch league test at the Santiago Bernabeu.
Real hope to close the five-point gap on league leaders Barcelona with victory over derby rivals Getafe later on Monday.
Barcelona began 2011 with a nervy 2-1 home win over Levante at Camp Nou to record an 11th consecutive league win and put the pressure on Real to respond.
"We have good statistics and that means we are doing things right," said Barca midfielder Andres Iniesta. "We have a life or death game (against Athletic Bilbao in the Kings Cup) on Wednesday now and we'll go there to get things right."
Madrid coach Jose Mourinho has lost Argentine striker Gonzalo Higuain for the rest of the season with a knee injury, but Brazilian star Kaka is back after a knee injury that has prevented him from playing this season.
"We have to construct a team without (Gonzalo) Higuain now as he is missing for six months but we had to do that when Kaka was missing," said Mourinho.
"Kaka won't start against Getafe but he could give us 15 or 20 minutes. He is a fantastic professional and has made a terrific effort to get fit again so he and everyone that helped deserved a lot of congratulations."
Getafe are on a run of four consecutive league wins and lie seventh in the Spanish first division.
In other matches, Atletico Madrid dropped two points in their bid for a Champions League place drawing 0-0 with Racing Santander on Monday.
Atletico go up to sixth in the table but lose pace on Valencia, 2-1 winners over Espanyol, who are four points ahead in fourth.
Real Mallorca kept their European hopes up starting the new year with a resounding 3-0 victory over promoted Hercules on Monday.
Islanders Mallorca are three points behind sixth-placed Atletico.
Elsewhere Real Zaragoza moved off the bottom with a sensational late 2-1 home win over Real Sociedad on Monday.
It was a first win in charge of Zaragoza for Mexican coach Javier Aguirre with Braulio's 90th minute winner lifting the club two places as Sporting Gijon replaced them at the bottom.
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