Borussia Dortmund clinch 2011 Bundesliga title

Borussia Dortmund clinched the 2011 Bundesliga title on Saturday, beating Nuremberg 2-0 while rivals Bayer Leverkusen crashed 2-0 in Cologne, dpa reported.

Lucas Barrios and Robert Lewandowski were on target before the break as Dortmund won their seventh German title overall and a first since 2002.

Dortmund have 72 points and can no longer be caught by Leverkusen, who are on 64 with two rounds left in the season after having to bow in Cologne from Milivoje Novakovic's second-half double.

Juergen Klopp's young Dortmund team took the Bundesliga lead in late October and never looked back. They were 12 points clear of Leverkusen in early March before stuttering slightly, allowing Bayer to move within five points ahead of Saturday's games.

The celebrations among the capacity crowd of 80,720 in Dortmund started in the 32nd minute when Barrios tapped home from short range after goalkeeper Raphael Schaefer had parried an initial effort from Mario Goetze.

Lewandowski doubled the lead 11 minutes later when Lewandowski took up a deep pass from Mats Hummels, lobbed Schaefer and scored into the empty net.

Leverkusen could have kept the title race alive with a victory in the Rhine-area duel with Cologne, but Stefan Kiessling was denied by the underside of the bar in the 52nd and Michael Ballack failed from point blank range.

Instead, Milivoje Novakovic was on target against the flow of play on the other end in the 67th by chipping over Rene Adler, and then scored his 16th goal of the season from short range to end Leverkusen's title dream with seven minutes left.

Cologne's first home win against Leverkusen in 14 years came with sports director Volker Finke as caretaker coach after the midweek resignation of Frank Schaefer.

Elsewhere, Hanover crashed 1-0 at home against lowly Borussia Moenchengladbach, Mainz 05 all but clinched fifth place for a Europa league berth with a 3-0 win over hapless Eintracht Frankfurt, Freiburg prevailed 2-0 at SV Hamburg, and Stuttgart rallied to win 2-1 at Hoffenheim.