Villarreal have comfortably beaten 10-man Rayo Vallecano 4-0 to move within two points of a Europa League place.

Giovani dos Santos came close to firing the hosts ahead after 10 minutes when he got a strike in at goal, but Ramiro Ruben was equal to the shot and turned it behind for a corner.

Villarreal did find the breakthrough shortly after, however, courtesy of Ikechukwu Uche who tapped into an empty net after being played through by Mateo Musacchio.

Bruno added a second for the Yellow Submarine before the interval when he was left unmarked inside the box to slot a first-time effort past Ruben to double his side's advantage.

Marcelino Garcia Toral's side made sure of the points shortly before the hour-mark when Jonathan Periera added goal number three with a fine strike from inside the box.

Vallecano's night was to get even worse moments later when Anaitz Arbilla was dismissed following a bad challenge, and Jaume Costa managed to make the most of the one-man advantage when he buried the fourth goal from a rebound.

Manuel Trigueros very nearly added another for Villarreal to add the icing to the cake, but his free kick came back off the bar late on.