Hearts hit five, Feyenoord beat AZ: around Europe's other leagues

The widest margin of the weekend in any top division did not come in England, Spain or Germany. It came in Edinburgh, where Hearts put five past St Mirren without reply at Tynecastle.

Five unanswered at home is a marker laid down in front of your own supporters. Hearts have been building something quietly this season, and results like this turn quiet optimism into open belief. Tynecastle has always been capable of generating momentum; now it has a scoreline to hang it on.

Celtic won 2-0 at Motherwell and Rangers beat Kilmarnock 3-1, so the usual suspects kept pace at the top of the Premiership. Both did what the fixture list asked of them without fuss. But the talk in Scottish football this week will be about the team from the capital rather than the two from Glasgow.

Aberdeen slipped again though, beaten 1-0 at home by St Johnstone in a result that deepens an increasingly uncomfortable run. Pittodrie expects better, and the pressure on the home dugout grows a little heavier with each flat afternoon.

In the Netherlands, Feyenoord's 2-0 over AZ Alkmaar was the pick of the round, a clean home win against a direct rival for the European places. These are the fixtures that decide the shape of a season in the Eredivisie, and Feyenoord handled it with the authority of a side that expects to be playing continental football.

Ajax could only draw 1-1 with NEC Nijmegen, another reminder that the Amsterdam giants remain a work in progress rather than the finished article. And Groningen produced the day's surprise, winning 5-1 away at Excelsior in a result nobody saw coming. Five goals on the road is a statement in any league.

Turkey's weekend belonged to the travelling giants. Fenerbahce won 3-0 at Rizespor and Trabzonspor matched that scoreline at Samsunspor, two emphatic away wins that keep the Super Lig's multi-horse race exactly as tight as it has been all season.

Winning away in Turkey is never straightforward, and for both title contenders to do it by the same scoreline on the same weekend feels like a duel conducted at a distance. Galatasaray were not in league action this round, which makes these twin statements all the more pointed.

Belgium served up the weekend's most chaotic fixture, where Mechelen edged a 4-3 classic against St Truiden. Seven goals, a lead changed hands, and a finish that had the home crowd on its feet long after the final whistle. Westerlo were more clinical in their 5-1 dismantling of Antwerp, a result that will raise eyebrows across the division.

In Portugal it was routine for the big two. Benfica beat Guimaraes 2-0 at home and Porto won 2-1 at Maritimo, both grinding out the kind of results that decide title races in May rather than headlines in October.

So beyond the spotlight of the big five, the shape of the European weekend was much the same: the strongest sides found a way, a few statement results were laid down, and the best story belonged to the neutrals in Belgium. The chasing pack across the continent keeps showing that the gap below the elite leagues is narrower than the coverage suggests.