Valencia have it all to do in the Champions League group stage’s final week after crashing to a 2-0 defeat at Zenit St Petersburg on Tuesday.
Their miserable evening started in just 15 minutes as a lovely, sweeping move from the Russians resulted in Oleg Shatov confidently finishing off a one-on-one with Jaume Domenech.
Zenit then blew Valencia away with another fantastic piece of intricate play in the latter stages of the second half, Artem Dzyuba burying a series of quick-fire interchanges sealing the win.
It was nothing more than Zenit deserved, having also secured top spot in Group H thanks to their fifth successive win, and they rounded off the match with an extra man as Ruben Vezo was shown a straight red card for cutting down Shatov as the last man.
The result means Valencia must now beat eliminated Lyon at Mestalla in a fortnight’s time to have any chance of reaching the knockout stage.
Zenit St Petersburg 2-0 Valencia
Shatov 15, Dzyuba 74 (Z) Vezo sent off 80 (V)
Zenit: Lodygin; Smolnikov (Yusupov 65), Garay, Lombaerts, Criscito; Neto (Evseev 86), Witsel; Shatov (Ryazantsev 84), Danny, Hulk, Dzyuba
Valencia: Jaume, Cancelo (De Paul 73), Vezo, Abdennour, Gaya; Parejo, Perez (Danilo 73), Gomes; Feghouli, Alcacer, Mir (Mina 56)
Referee: Moen [NOR]
