Javier Clemente squeezed into blue tights, pulled red knickers over the top and slapped a big yellow S on his chest. A quick fiddle with Photoshop and the amazing transformation was complete. Real Valladolid's manager had, in his own words, gone into the phonebox Scum and come out a Saint; he had, in Athletic Bilbao manager Joaquín Caparrós's words, gone from whore to nun in five minutes. The man they loved to hate became the man they had to love, glossing over years of insult and insinuation to stagger up to him and slur: "You're me best mate, you are." They were desperate and the clock was ticking; he was their only hope. As La Liga entered its decisive final day, the bastard Basque became the Caped Crusader, Superman striding across the cover of Marca – the man who was going to save the day. "We believe in you, Javi!" cheered AS, "you can do it!"

Not rescue Real Valladolid from relegation – let's face it, they couldn't give a monkey's about that – but rescue Real Madrid from another season finishing empty handed. For the first time since 1983, three relegation places and the league title were undecided on the final day. So too was the final Champions League slot and the two Europa League places. After all that, it had come down to this; it promised to be the most heart-stopping, nerve-racking, dramatic final day ever.

There were 3,486,784,401 possible combinations but, with a solitary point separating them, one, which was actually two, mattered more than any other: Madrid winning against Málaga and Barça not winning against Valladolid at the Camp Nou. Valladolid were going to do for Madrid what Madrid couldn't do for themselves: take points off Barça. Take the league off them. They were going to park the bus at the Camp Nou and send the title to the Bernabéu.

There was just one flaw in the plan: it was rubbish. And so, mostly, was the final day. Barcelona, on the other hand, weren't. Clemente couldn't save Madrid. He couldn't save Valladolid. And Madrid couldn't even save themselves. As for parking the bus, he'd parked a Sinclair C5. With a broken wheel. If he'd become a nun in five minutes, he went back again almost as quickly. Resistance was futile and there was no drama.

Barcelona might not have actually ended the night with the trophy in their hands – after all, that would involve the league being organised – but they did end it with fireworks and a rumble down the Ramblas, 'fans' breaking and burning things for a laugh. They ended the night with every player – except Zlatan Ibrahimovic, who muttered "fuck off Piqué" in English – taking the mic to declare "Visca Barça, Visca Catalunya". And, in truth, they were always going to. A nervous start gave way to a stuffing, Barcelona wrapping up the league much as they have played it.

By 7.04pm, Manucho – the striker who promised 40 goals and scored four – had missed a sitter. And that was pretty much that; Valladolid's miracle had gone and taken Madrid's hope with it. By 7.05pm, Madrid were a goal down in Málaga. By 7.26pm Luis Prieto's own goal had given Barcelona the lead. And by 7.31pm it was 2-0. By 8.45pm, they had won 4-0, Leo Messi getting two goals to take his league total to 34, 47 in all competitions – equalling the club record set by Original Ronaldo in 1996-97. Madrid had got an equaliser 43 minutes earlier but it didn't matter; all too aware of the score in Barcelona, they had virtually given up. Forget drama, for the entire night Barça were champions.

Which felt just, somehow. Before he'd even taken any questions in his post-match press conference, Pep Guardiola insisted: "I would like to congratulate Real Madrid, a club I admire. They have been fantastic opponents and without them we would never have reached 99 points." But while Madrid had pushed Barcelona all the way to the final day, while they have kept the campaign going, there has also been something a little doomed, maybe even artificial, about their pursuit and ultimately there could be no complaints – even for those who complained, still pathetically clingingly to conspiracies. In fact, as Madrid's players boarded their plane last night the disappointment was tinged with a feeling of relief that it was at last all over. "I always thought the miracle was extremely unlikely," Sergio Ramos admitted.

Barcelona's campaign has been virtually impeccable. In the league at least – as Guardiola took the mic last night, he told the fans: "We should be somewhere else [the Champions League final] on Saturday and we're not. We owe you one." Four defeats all season have left them with just one trophy; 23 defeats could see Atlético win two. It would have been faintly ridiculous if they hadn't even won one. After all, in the league Barcelona have beaten Madrid twice, lost just once and racked up a record 99 points; they have the winner of the Zamora and Pichichi awards, and finished with a goal difference of +74. Expected to drop points against Villarreal and Sevilla as the pressure built, they scored seven times. When they dropped points against Espanyol it was taken as a defeat but insisted that was the point that allowed them to win the league. They have not even had to come back from behind for a single one of their 31 victories and have been top or joint top for all bar six weeks of the season.

The final day elsewhere …

But if the way the final day unfolded felt just, it also felt a bit, well, flat. It felt like so much of this season has felt; every week, D-day was postponed but when D-day came at the top and the bottom, it just wasn't that dramatic. In fact, it ended up being a squib so damp you wondered if it had spent the last month stuffed into the deepest recesses of an otter's pocket. The closeness, the pressure and the tension was a red herring; the chance was always there but reality was different. On the final day of the season, only one game was irrelevant – step forward Deportivo de La Coruña – and every significant place except third, taken by Valencia, was still open. But if everyone expected La Liga to spend week 38 frantically chopping and changing like Henry VIII, it didn't happen.

Of the seven key places up for grabs on the final day, six ended up being occupied by the same teams that occupied them at the start of the day: Barcelona at the top, Sevilla in the Champions League, Getafe and Mallorca in the Europa League, and Xérez and Tenerife in the second division. The same teams that occupied them virtually all day. The same teams that have occupied them virtually all year, in fact. Getafe's Europa League place was safe from the start; Xérez's relegation was a done deal. It all was.

Relegation ...

At the bottom, five teams were within three points of each other, four of them level on 36 points. But still virtually nothing moved. According to the LFP, at the start of the final day, Xerez, Tenerife and Málaga were down (although the Spanish Football Federation's website disagreed, showing Valladolid in the relegation zone instead of Málaga); at 7.08pm it was Racing, Tenerife and Xérez and by 7.26pm, it was Valladolid, Tenerife and Xérez and that was that. There was still an hour and 20 minutes left but nothing changed. And while it is easy to say with hindsight, the three who fell always seemed likely to fall. Although it was last week, Valladolid had been out of the relegation zone only once – and that was on goal difference – in 17 weeks; Tenerife have been in the relegation zone for the whole of the second half of the season and Xérez have been in the relegation zone since week two and bottom for 26 weeks.

In the end, Racing Santander and Málaga survived. Survival came with 37 points – the lowest it has ever been under three points for a win. It also came to at least one side that everyone expected to survive. Racing were facing nothing-to-play-for Sporting Gijón, the leader of the Cantabrian government Miguel-Ángel Revilla had appealed for Sporting's fans to support his side and not their own in an act of Cantabrian-Asturian brotherhood, and mostly they had said "OK then". Not least because they hadn't forgotten Valladolid's fans chanting about how they were going to get relegated last year. Racing were two up within 10 minutes of the second half starting and never in the relegation zone.

Right down the other end of Spain, Málaga did escape the relegation zone, prompting a proper pitch invasion, and leaving tearful president Fernando Sanz crying on the shoulder of Florentino Pérez – once his sworn enemy – and declaring that he would fine any players not found out on the town at five in the morning. And yet even they had been in the relegation zone just once in 20 weeks. And had been out of it from the fourth minute.

... And the Champions League and Europa League places ...

Luckily, there was drama in Palma. Not for the first time – as any one who remembers that Rivaldo goal can testify – the most ridiculous climax happened to the teams chasing the Champions League places.

When the final whistle went on Mallorca's match against Espanyol on Saturday night, Real Mallorca were fourth and in the Champions League having just won 2-0 and with Sevilla drawing 2-2 in Almería. Sevilla were a man down having had Alvaro Negredo sent off for the third time this season but rather than send on Luis Fabiano, the Brazilian striker who had scored 15 league goals in just 18 starts, coach Antonio Álvarez sent on a 19-year-old kid called Rodri who had played just four minutes. Four minutes had been added on, but the game was already well into the 93rd; the season was drawing to a close. It was nearly midnight and up in the presidential box, Sevilla's sporting director Monchi was silently, desperately saying a prayer.

Sevilla, in short, were doomed. Mallorca's players and staff gathered in the centre circle at the Son Moix, giant bottles of champagne at their feet, ready to be popped, and together with their fans watched the final 45 seconds on the scoreboard high in the stands, hastily switched to TV channel La Sexta. Even the club's cuddly devil mascot Dimoni – the real star of their campaign this season – was there with his squidgy pitchfork, forked tail and cheesy grin, sitting, oversized hands covering his great big googly foam eyes, heart in his gaping mouth, all ready to start celebrating in style.

And then, through the pixels, it happened. Jesús Navas's cross was knocked down and bounced up. High. Ten yards out. Rodri leapt vertically, flipped himself sideways and somehow volleyed it in; 3-2, 93rd minute, fourth place! Crisis averted. A 19-year-old whom no one had ever heard of had just sent Sevilla into the Champions League with 45 seconds left. And sent Mallorca out. Cameras caught Monchi launching himself across the directors' box and into the arms of a colleague, practically humping him in delight. Back at the Son Moix, Mallorca's players slumped, like Striker's co-pilot with the valve removed. They just lay flat, motionless against the turf, tears in their eyes, unpopped bottles at their side. They say there's nothing worse than seeing a grown man cry but there is. Seeing a grown man in an acrylic devil costume cry. Seeing 35 grown men cry. In front of 20,000 fans. And live on television.

Results: Athletic 2-0 Deportivo, Atlético 0-3 Getafe, Zaragoza 3-3 Villarreal, Almería 2-3 Sevilla, Mallorca 2-0 Espanyol, Valencia 1-0 Tenerife, Racing 2-0 Sporting, Osasuna 1-1 Xérez, Málaga 1-1 Madrid, Barcelona 4-0 Valladolid.

Champions: Barcelona

Champions League: Madrid, Valencia, Sevilla

Europa League: Mallorca, Getafe (and possibly still Villarreal)

Relegated: Xérez, Valladolid, Tenerife

Zamora: Valdés

Pichichi: Messi, 34

Copa del Rey final, Wednesday: Atlético v Sevilla

Final La Liga table