Paris Saint-Germain’s unbeaten start to the season is over after a 2-0 defeat away to Arsenal in the UEFA Champions League on Tuesday. Goals from Kai Havertz and Bukayo Saka were enough for the Gunners at the Emirates Stadium, despite Luis Enrique seeing his side hit the woodwork several times in the second round of League Phase play.
It was a familiar script for PSG to frustrate last season’s UCL semi-final against Borussia Dortmund with plenty of possession and sight of goal, but not enough sharpness. In a new twist on top of Kylian Mbappe no longer being there for the French giants was the surprise omission of Ousmane Dembele, whose brilliance took them to the last four.
The exclusion of the France international was a major talking point ahead of the match, along with Les Parisiens’ most recent trip to England, which resulted in a cleansing 4-1 thrashing of Newcastle United. Even more surprising, Randal Kolo Muani started again as a substitute, alongside Fabian Ruiz, who was so impressive at UEFA Euro 2024 with Spain this summer.
It turned out that, while not too surprising, Dembele’s idiosyncratic creativity and guile was sorely missed on the right, while lightweight, makeshift attacking experiments may work in Ligue 1, but not in UCL. The insistence on an out-of-form Warren Zaire-Emery was also questionable from Luis Enrique as his slide had been evident for some time.
Lee Kang-in and Desire Doue were preferred to move forward, while Vitinha was returned to midfield after an injury, but it took more than an hour before the Spaniard opted to make changes. Nuno Mendes and Achraf Hakimi created a lot of space in the build-up, with the Portuguese in particular showing his attacking teeth when he hit the post when he was 1-0 down.
However, neither wing-back is known for their defensive soundness and that was part of PSG’s downfall in London, with two conceding avoidable goals. It’s true that Mendes hit a post in the second half and Joao Neves also hit the crossbar as the Ligue 1 champions hunted for a goal, but Paris had little to show for that at the end of the match and remained vulnerable in the air.
“It was a difficult start for us because we couldn’t escape their pressure and it took a while before we started to press,” captain Marquinhos said after the match. “We made mistakes and paid for them with the goals. They took advantage of our weaknesses with two goals from crosses. The game will help us in the future.”
“We came to play well and didn’t do that from the start. It was complicated, but in the second half we were better and more aggressive. We are a team that plays with the ball, likes possession and tries to lure the opponent in. ” create space. We didn’t do that at the beginning and they scored the two goals in the first half.”
For all the debate about Luis Enrique’s tactical gambles, however, the biggest gamble feels like the continued persistence with Gianluigi Donnarumma in goal after two more big mistakes. The Azzurri star had made a mistake when he misjudged the flight of the ball as it came in from Havertz’s header after 20 minutes, before failing to follow Saka’s play for 15 minutes.
Despite Donnarumma’s proven international quality, there have been too many high-profile blunders during his time at PSG. Most baffling of all is how utterly predictable it all is, to the point that it calls into question much of the discussion about what Luis Enrique will have seen from his players on the pitch.
Individually, Lee, Willian Pacho and Neves didn’t look out of depth, but the setup wasn’t conducive to getting the best out of star man Barcola, while Doue isn’t really a wide man. The combination of no Dembele, Lee on a false nine over the regular center of Kolo Muani and Ruiz not playing from the start was perhaps as good as the doomed PSG.
That said, PSG looked better after the changes, but hardly much more impressive and it feels very similar to this time last year when the new French giants were considered a work in progress. Based on this showing, they remain a work in progress that could bear fruit down the road, though there’s no guarantee anything will come to fruition this year.