Barça put 5 goals past Gimnástic and were only 9 minutes away from becoming champions of Spain before a late own goal by Mallorca's Basinas and another from José Reyes took the title to Madrid, thanks to Real Madrid's superior head-to-head record over Barça.

Barça dominated the game at the Nou Estadi from the start and could have been 1-0 up, but Samuel Eto'o was unable to steer Ronaldinho's cross home.

On 15 minutes, the entire Nou Estadi burst into noise because over in Madrid, Valera had given Real Mallorca the lead against Real Madrid. Barça now led the table by one point and if things stayed as they were, Barcelona would be the champions.

Things got even better 5 minutes later, Lionel Messi skipped past several Gimnástic players before crossing the ball for captain Carles Puyol to prod Barça ahead. That goal now put Barça 3 points clear of Madrid and it was fitting that it was the captain Puyol who scored the goal.

On the 34th minute, Lionel Messi again skipped past several Nástic defenders before unleashing a powerful curling shot past Rubén Pérez in the Gimnástic goal to make it 0-2 Barça in Tarragona.

That wasn't the end of the scoring for Barcelona in the first half. Ronaldinho scored his 21st goal of the season with a freekick on 38 minutes.

At halftime, Barcelona were top of the table with 76 points, with Real Madrid, who were still trailing Mallorca 0-1 at the Bernabéu, second with 73 points and Sevilla, who were still level with Villarreal at the Sánchez Pizjuán, third with 72 points.

The second half started off in the same fashion as the first, with Barcelona dominating the game and Gimnástic doing nothing else other than making up the numbers.

A minute before the hour mark, Lionel Messi tapped in his 14th league goal of the season from a few centimetres out after some great work by Samuel Eto'o.

After that goal, Barça understandably dropped the tempo as they had done everything they needed to do to win the title and now only needed to hope that Mallorca could hold on for a victory or a draw at the Santiago Bernabéu.

The now buzzing Nou Estadi went quiet on 68 minutes as news filtered in that José Antonio Reyes had scored Real Madrid's equalising goal at the Bernabéu. Barça were still topping the table and were two points clear of Real Madrid in the league table. Meanwhile down in Seville, Villarreal had taken the lead against Sevilla and the Andalusian's title challenge looked all but over.

With only 9 minutes left on the clock in Tarragona and Madrid, it looked as if Barcelona would be crowned as champions, but an own goal by Basinas over in Madrid in the 81st minute changed everything around - they were now champions and Barça were now second in the table.

The Barça fans and those Nástic fans who were supporting Barça all fell silent as news that Madrid took the lead filtered through.

On 83 minutes, Barça's misery was compounded as José Reyes scored a second for Madrid to seal the title whilst at the same time, Grahn scored a goal for Gimnástic to deny Victor Valdés a clean sheet.

With all hopes of the title now dead in the water, Barça went in search of a final goal to put some gloss in this now meaningless victory and Gianluca Zambrotta duly found that goal in stoppage time.