Christian Benteke was at his imperious best, scoring a stunning hat-trick as Aston Villa thumped Sunderland 6-1 in their English Premier League game at Villa Park Monday.

Defender Ron Vlaar opened the scoring for Villa, before Danny Rose equalized for the away side. However, Villa went in to the break 2-1 up, thanks to a strike from Andreas Weimann, before Benteke destroyed Sunderland in the space of 17 second half minutes

Gabriel Agbonlahor added the gloss late on, with Sunderland also having Stephane Sessegnon sent off.

Sunderland lost their chance to get to the magical 40-point mark, and the relegation battle continues unabated following Villa's convincing win, with at least five teams still very much in danger of playing in the Championship next season.

Villa are nor level on points with Sunderland and Newcastle on 37 points, with third bottom Wigan five points adrift, having played a game less. Norwich are 14^th on 38 points.

After an entertaining opening half an hour, Vlaar made it 1-0 for Villa with a brilliant strike from 30 yards for his first goal for the club.

However, a minute later Sunderland were level, with left-back Rose combining well with Danny Graham before firing past Villa goalkeeper Brad Guzan.

Villa, though, went into the break with a one-goal lead when Matthew Lowton found Andreas Weimann with an excellent pass. The Villa forward controlled the ball nicely, before finding the back of the net.

Villa doubled their lead ten minutes into the first half. Gabriel Agbonlahor saw his shot stopped by Simon Mignolet, but Benteke was on hand to head home into an empty net.

In the 59^th minute, Villa had their fourth and Benteke his second, when the striker fired a header off a corner.

Sessegnon was then given his marching orders in the 70^th minute for a late challenge on Yacouba Sylla, before Benteke completed his hat-trick a couple of minutes later.

Agbonlahor tried a fancy flick, which found its way to Benteke, courtesy a deflection from defender Carlos Cuellar, and the Belgian made no mistake in slotting it past Mignolet.

The icing on the cake was added when Agbonlahor latched onto a misplaced pass from substitute David Vaughan, before rounding Mignolet to slot home.