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UEFA Champions League, GW 6 Round-up: Arsenal, Barcelona top groups; Atletico Madrid suffer first defeat
Arsenal and PSG have qualified from the group, while third placed Ludogorets will have another crack at the continental competition, in the second-rung Europa League.
New Delhi: Arsenal and Barcelona dished out sumptuous football treats on Tuesday night with thumping wins over Basel and Borrusia Moenchengladbach in their respective final group matches of UEFA Champions League.
At St. Jakob-Park in Basel, Arsene Wenger's side scored a brace on either side of half to beat Swiss champions 4-1. Lucas Perez and Alex Iwobi scored for the Premier League side.
Unheralded Spain midfielder Perez captured a hat-trick, scoring in the 8th, 16th, and 47th minutes, and Iwobi added the fourth in the 53rd minute.
Seydou Doumbia scored the consolation goal for the home side in their final Group A match.
The win helped Gunners top the group with 14 points, two more than their closest rivals Paris Saint-Germain (PSG), who were held to a surprising 2-2 draw at home by visiting Ludogorets from Bulgaria.
Arsenal and PSG have qualified from the group, while third placed Ludogorets will have another crack at the continental competition, in the second-rung Europa League.
Basel finished last in the four-team group, with two points, one less than Ludogorets.
In Group B, Italian giants Napoli beat Benfica 2-1 in a tight game at Lisbon's Estadio da Luz to wrest the top spot from the Portuguese side.
Jose Callejon and Dries Mertens scored for the visiting sides in the 60th and 79th minutes. Raul Jimenez scored a late goal to reduce the gap.
Napoli, with 11 points, topped the group while Benfica (8). The Portuguese side got the better of Besiktas by a single point, and qualified for Europa League.
In their final group game, Besiktas, reduced to 9-men at Olympic Stadium in Kiev, received a 0-6 thrashing from Ukrainian side Dynamo Kyiv.
German defender Andreas Beck got a send off in the 29th minute. 25 minutes later, Cameroon forward Vincent Aboubakar received his own marching orders after his second yellow card.
It was the first win for Kiev, but their five points from the six games were not enough to earn an Europa League spot. Besiktas, with seven points, have booked the spot from their group.
At Camp Nou, Barcelona shrugged off their disappointing El Clasico draw with Real Madrid to beat Moenchengladbach 4-0.
Arda Turan, unexpectedly, scored a second-half hat-trick after Lionel Messi opened the scoring in the 16th minute.
It was Messi's 10th goal of the competition, which is four more than second placed Edinson Cavani of PSG.
The win assured Barca a top-place finish in Group C.
Former Barca boss Pep Guardiola, however, had a tough night with back-to-back disappointing matches as visiting Celtic forced a 1-1 draw at Etihad Stadium.
In the absence of Sergio Aguero, Kelechi Iheanacho turned up for Manchester City and scored the equalier in the eighth minute and salvaged a point.
Four minutes into the game, 19-year-old Patrick Roberts had given Celtic a surprise lead. But the visitors failed to capitalise and ended up sharing the spoils, which left them bottom of the group, with three points.
With five points, Monchengladbach have booked an Europa League spot.
In Group D, Atletico Madrid suffered their first defeat of the campaign, losing 0-1 to Bayern Munich at Allianz Arena.
Robert Lewandowski for the Bavarians in the 28th minute, and it was enough to earn all three points. Atletico, with 15 points topped the group, ahead of Bayern (12).
At Eindhoven's Philips Stadion, PSV and FK Rostov played a goal-less draw, thus giving the Russian side a third placed finish with five points. PSV finished their campaign with a disappointing 2 points.