Helter-skelter end in sight to La Liga

t takes a singular situation for the Liga schedulers to program all 10 Primera División fixtures at the same time (Sunday, 9pm), but the ongoing relegation struggle engulfing the nine teams from Zaragoza in 18th to Málaga in 10th is one such situation. Racing Santander ensured its top-flight status by capitalizing on Atlético's dissolution as a coherent soccer side in a 2-1 midweek win but the rest of the teams with Segunda's icy breath on their necks have a weekend of jangling nerves in store.

Shorn of the psychological buffer of foreknowledge of other results, it will be a particularly testing 90 minutes for both Getafe and Deportivo, two clubs with Primera pedigree. Depor has not experienced life outside the top division in two decades and was a Champions League semifinalist as recently as 2004 and won the King's Cup in 2002, finishing in the top three for five consecutive seasons during that spell, when it enjoyed the prefix "Super."

For Getafe, memories of epic Uefa Cup clashes with Bayern Munich and an incredible King's Cup semifinal win over Barça are fading fast. Its most recent outing was a 4-0 drubbing by neighbor Real Madrid.

Getafe's new owners, Royal Emirates Group, have targeted a top-six finish next season, the Champions League in two years and replacing Real Madrid as the capital's dominant force in the long term. Failure to obtain points from its home match against Osasuna, which proved its mettle in a 3-2 comeback win over Sevilla on Wednesday, coupled with any kind of positive result for Zaragoza at Espanyol, could force Getafe's Emirate benefactors to hastily redraw such grand designs.

Málaga, also bankrolled by a regal investor in Sheikh Abdullah Al-Thani, despite being in the upper half of the standing, can still be relegated if it fails to gain any points from its last two matches and other results conspire against it. Manuel Pellegrini's side travels to Europa League-chasing Athletic before a final day match against Barça in what will be a festive atmosphere at Camp Nou, which is hardly ideal from Málaga's point of view.

Sporting Gijón has perhaps the kindest run-in, at home to redeemed Racing and then away to already-doomed Hércules.