Roberto Soldado converted a late penalty, as Valencia defeated nine-man Espanyol 2-1 at Mestalla.
With Mauricio Pellegrino's men hosting the bottom-of-the-table side, it was perhaps no surprise to see them dominate the early exchanges.
Soldado missed a pair of chances within the first 10 minutes, but it didn't take them long to open the scoring. Just six minutes later, Viera pounced on a lucky ricochet before calmly slotting the ball into the net.
Slowly however, the Periquitos got themselves back into the game, and equalised just after half an hour. Longo received the ball from Joan Verdu and rather fortunately looped the ball over Diego Alves.
After the break, both sides went all out looking for the decisive goal. Tino Costa had two strikes saved well by Cristian Alvarez, and Mauricio Pochettino’s side could have bagged the winner themselves – Joan Verdu’s effort however, was tipped wide by Alves.
It was eventually Los Che who grabbed all three points however. Hector Moreno handled inside the area, as he and Sergio Garcia were shown red cards for their protests. And it was left to Soldado to convert the resulting spot-kick