A place in the Copa del Rey semi-finals will be on the line when Real Madrid make the short trip across the city for Wednesday's last-eight clash with Leganes.

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Real Madrid's La Liga title bid suffered a setback in Saturday's trip to the RCDE Stadium, falling to a narrow 1-0 defeat to relegation-threatened Espanyol following an effort from Carlos Romero, who was fortunate to escape a red card for an earlier tackle on Kylian Mbappe.

As a result of their first league defeat since December 4, leaders Real Madrid are now sitting just one point clear of second-placed Atletico Madrid ahead of Saturday's derby clash between the two at the Santiago Bernabeu.

Meanwhile, Barcelona are just four points behind their Clasico rivals, demonstrating that Los Blancos still have plenty of work to do if they are to retain their La Liga crown.

However, they will put their title bid on hold to focus on Wednesday's cup tie, with the visitors set to feature in the quarter-finals for the second time in three seasons after successfully negotiating two rounds of Copa del Rey action.

Carlo Ancelotti's charges kicked off their Copa del Rey campaign with a dominant 5-0 win over fourth-tier Deportivo Minera, before they eventually claimed a 5-2 extra-time win over Celta Vigo after they had given up a two-goal advantage in their last-16 tie.

The 20-time Copa del Rey winners will be the heavy favourites to advance from the quarter-final tie, especially as they have already recorded a comfortable win at Butarque this season, with Mbappe, Federico Valverde and Jude Bellingham all finding the net in November's 3-0 away victory over Leganes.

Leganes are competing in the Copa del Rey quarter-finals after navigating their way through four rounds of matches to set up a tricky tie against the reigning European champions.

After edging out Cuidad de Lucena, Leganes required penalties to get the better of fourth-tier Estepona in the second round, before they went on to claim a narrow 2-1 victory over Cartagena from the Segunda Division.

Borja Jimenez's side got the better of another second-tier team in last month's quarter-final against Almeria, overturning a 2-1 deficit to claim a 3-2 victory thanks to a Miguel de la Fuente penalty and Diego Garcia's 86th-minute winner.

The wins over Cartagena and Almeria helped Los pepineros put together a five-game unbeaten run in all competitions, with their impressive form including a surprise 1-0 home win over Atletico Madrid and a hard-fought goalless draw against Athletic Bilbao at San Mames.

Unfortunately for Leganes, their unbeaten run drew to a close in Friday's La Liga home clash against fellow Madrid side Rayo Vallecano, which saw Sergio Gonzalez shown a straight red card before Pathe Ciss scored the decisive goal to condemn Los pepineros to a narrow defeat, leaving them in 16th place with a two-point gap to the bottom three.

Having lost four of their last five home games, Leganes know they will have their work cut out to spring a surprise in Wednesday's cup tie, but they may be able to take some inspiration from the fact they prevailed in their most recent Copa del Rey quarter-final against none other than Real Madrid, progressing on away goals after playing out a 2-2 draw across two legs in the 2017-18 competition.

Leganes possible starting lineup:

Soriano; Altimira, Rosier, Gonzalez, Nastasic, Cruz; Raba, Neyou, Tapia, Rodriguez; De La Fuente

Real Madrid possible starting lineup:

Lunin; Vazquez, Tchouameni, Asencio, Mendy; Valverde, Modric; Brahim, Bellingham, Vinicius; Mbappe