Villarreal fought back to to hand Barcelona their first league defeat since late December on Sunday but that didn’t dampen the post-match celebrations as the Catalan club lifted the LaLiga trophy.
Hansi Flick’s side already secured the title after Thursday’s 2-0 win at city rivals Espanyol gave them an unassailable lead over the competition with two games left to play.
And Sunday’s match at Barcelona’s Olympic Stadium was the chance to celebrate their triumph in front of their home fans.
There were jubilant scenes as captain Marc-Andre ter Stegen made his way out on to the pitch, picking up the huge trophy and carrying it over to his team-mates and lifting it aloft.
The stars were then joined on the pitch by their family and friends and they paraded their silverware in front of their adoring supporters.
‘I think Villarreal played a good game… but what matters is that we are champions,’ Barca’s Fermin Lopez, who scored their second goal to make it 2-1 at the end of the first half, told DAZN before he joined his teammates in the trophy-lifting celebrations.
‘I’m happy to have scored a goal, although it didn’t help us to grab another win that we really wanted. However, the important thing is that we’ve won the league and that’s it, we deserve it and let’s keep the celebration going.’
Former Newcastle and Leicester forward Ayoze Perez opened the scoring for the visitors, finding the net from a counter-attack in the fourth minute.
Yet Barca’s Lamine Yamal levelled in the 38th minute with another fine individual effort, cutting in front the right and curling strike and
Lopez gave them the lead with a shot from the edge of the box in first-half stoppage time.
However, Santi Comesana equalised five minutes after the break and Canadian Tajon Buchanan fired the winner from a Gerard Moreno cross in the 80th minute, a result that secured Villarreal a spot in the Champions League next season.
Ahead of the final weekend of the campaign, Champions Barca are top on 85 points, four ahead second-placed Real Madrid, with Atletico in third on 73 points.
Athletic Bilbao, on 70 points, and Villarreal, on 67, complete LaLiga’s top five, who will represent Spain in next season’s Champions League.
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