Ibrahimovic was left out of the starting line-up after picking up an ankle injury in Tuesday night's 4-1 win at Racing Santander.

But the Sweden striker has been making good progress in his recovery and was called upon after Thierry Henry was forced off through injury just short of the half-hour mark.

And Ibrahimovic was on the scoresheet 10 minutes later to bag his fifth goal in as many league games since joining from Inter Milan in the summer.

But Pique took even less time to make an impact, netting a second for the Catalans only three minutes after replacing Dmytro Chygrynskiy just short of an hour, before Malaga had Duda sent off late on.

Real Madrid continued their 100% start to the season after producing a classy second-half display to beat battling Tenerife 3-0 at the Bernabeu.

Manuel Pellegrini's decision to introduce Kaka and Guti at the break proved decisive as Madrid put an uninspiring first-half performance behind them to take the spoils thanks to a Karim Benzema brace and a 25-yard strike from Kaka.

The victory means Madrid now boast five wins from five while promoted Tenerife, who hit the post in the second half and were unlucky to come up against some inspired goalkeeping from Iker Casillas, slipped to their third successive away loss.

Athletic Bilbao's early-season momentum came to a stunning halt as they were thrashed 4-0 at home by Sevilla.

In a match expected to be a close encounter between two teams in the top four, Sevilla mercilessly swept aside their hosts with three goals before half-time from Renato, Alvaro Negredo and Fredi Kanoute.

Any slim hopes of an Athletic fightback were further hit with the 55th-minute dismissal of Fernando Amorebieta for a second bookable offence, and Jesus Navas completed the rout with 15 minutes to go.

Maxi Rodriguez scored a late equaliser as struggling Atletico Madrid drew 2-2 at Valencia.

Sergio Aguero had put Atletico ahead before Pablo Hernandez and David Villa responded for the home side.