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Barcelona suffered a shock 3-2 home defeat to Shakhtar Donetsk in their final Champions League match while Sporting beat Basel 1-0 in Switzerland.

The Group C encounter was meaningless. Barca and Sporting had already qualified - the Catalan giants as group winners - Shakhtar were through to the UEFA Cup, while Basel's European season was over.

Olexandr Gladkiy hit a brace for Shakhtar against a weakened Barcelona side ahead of the Clasico against Real Madrid on Saturday.

Gladkiy gave visitors the lead on 31 minutes, finishing from inside the penalty area after Willian had cut back Razvan Rat's ball down the left channel.

The forward doubled the advantage on 58 minutes with a header from close range, only for former Arsenal left-back Sylvinho to smash inside the near post less than a minute later after playing a one-two with Seydou Keita.

Shakhtar restored their two-goal cushion through Fernandinho at the far post in the 76th minute, the Brazilian finishing Rat's low cross into an open goal.

The Blaugrana again pulled one back when substitute Eidur Gudjohnsen clipped a lovely ball over the top for Sergio Busquets to control and finish with seven minutes left, but they were unable to score an equaliser in the closing stages.

The home defence looked shaky with expensive 21-year-old Martin Caceres exposed on a number of occasions.

But Barca boss Josep Guardiola will not be too downhearted after seeing several young prospects fit into his fluid passing system, including Pedro, Sergio Busquets, Victor Sanchez and Victor Vazquez.

There was a flurry of yellow cards issued by English referee Mike Riley to away players in the last minutes as Shakhtar held on for the win.

Basel 0-1 Sporting

Sporting wrapped up a successful group campaign with a largely meaningless 1-0 away win over hapless Swiss champions Basel.

The Lisbon side dominated the early exchanges and were rewarded with a well-worked goal from Yannick Djalo in the 19th minute.

Basel, rooted to the bottom of the group with one point from their previous five outings, came close to a freakish reply on the hour when Marco Carreira nearly diverted a hopeful Benjamin Huggel pass over his own goal-line.

Substitute Valentin Stocker then drew an impressive close-range save from reserve Sporting keeper Tiago during a frantic final flurry from the home side in an increasingly heavy snowstorm.

Jonathan Symcox / Reuters