Published 1/14/2007 10:20:19 PM by AFP from Madrid

MADRID (AFP) - Real Madrid showed that they can be successful without David Beckham, who was watching from the VIP stands, as they claimed their first win in four outings with a 1-0 victory over Real Zaragoza.

Ruud Van Nistelrooy got the only goal to keep the Spanish giants in third place but move them to just two points behind the league leaders Sevilla. "There´s been a lot of talk about players not continuing at this club in the last few days. (Real coach Fabio) Capello took a firm decision," said Real Madrid´s sporting director Pedrag Mijatovic after the game.

"He (Beckham) has signed with another club so it was obviously there were going to be few opportunities for him to play. But you can see that we have young players who are very motivated."

Van Nistelrooy got his tenth goal of the season in typical poaching fashion after 41 minutes.  Jose Antonio Reyes sent a short corner to Robinho, who in turn put a pass across the face of the goal for new Argentine signing Gonzalo Higuain to turn the ball back and leave van Nistelrooy with the job of sidefooting the ball into the net. Real marginally had the best of an uninspiring first half before the Van Nistelrooy goal but they stepped up a gear and dominated the second half despite not adding to their tally.

Higuain was particularly impressive on his debut in the Santiago Bernabeu providing some telling passes and had several good shots. "I´m very happy. I had a good feeling here," said Higuain, who has moved quickly to step into the slot alongside Van Nistelrooy that is likely to be soon vacated permanently by another departing superstar Ronaldo.

Ruben De La Red also almost scored after 68 minutes, just a few seconds after taking over from Reyes, but had his shot just turned away for a corner by Zaragoza goalkeeper Cesar Perez. Ironically, Zaragoza are currently negotiating for the loan of De la Red, one of the brightest stars of the Real Madrid reserve team that plies its trade in the Spanish second division.

De La Red has said that he wants to go to get more top level playing time but Capello´s decision to axe Beckham and Antonio Cassano could open up a place for him in Real´s first team squad.  Robinho also went close 16 minutes before the end after outpacing Zaragoza´s flagging defenders but was just fractionally off-target.

The closest Zaragoza came to scoring was when Gerard Pique sent the ball into the box from the edge of the area and it hit the post, although more by accident than design. One negative note for Real Madrid was club captain Raul Gonzalez straining his right hamstring early in the game. He was replaced by Robinho after 14 minutes although the injury did not appear too serious and Raul spent the rest of the game in the dug out.

Real´s under-fire coach Capello celebrated the win by making an obscene gesture towards a section of the crowd that had been calling for his head after the run of rece nt poor results. The Spanish media also speculated on Sunday that disgruntled Chelsea boss Jose Mourinho could take over from Capello in the summer.

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