Young talents instead of world stars: Can Paris Saint-Germain also exist against FC Liverpool with this new philosophy in the Champions League?
There were times when Paris Saint-Germain wanted to force success. In order to fulfill the big dream of winning the Champions League, Lionel Messi and Neymar were submitted to the French capital. President Nasser Al-Khelaifi invested huge amounts in the squad as chairman of the Qatar Sports Investments.
The last world star went with Mbappe
The stars came and the stars went. Renowned coaches also put the jack in hand – among other things, Carlo Ancelotti, Laurent Blanc, Unai Emery, Thomas Tuchel and Mauricio Pochettino worked at the Seine. But it was never enough to victory in the premier class.
Messi has long been playing in Miami, Neymar is now back at FC Santos. And with Kylian Mbappe, who moved to Real Madrid, the last world star has now left Paris in summer.
Nevertheless, PSG made it into the round of 16 of the Champions League. There it goes against Liverpool FC. The first leg will kick off on Wednesday in the Prince Park at home, on Tuesday (March 11th) it goes to the Anfield Road for the second leg.
Access have a different quality
A new philosophy has returned to the blue-red. Although the club continues to throw money (the current transfer record has a minus of 109.82 million euros), but the access has a different quality.
Desire Doue of Paris St. Germain in the game against Stade Brest.
Paris currently has a number of exceptional young people who have an outstanding way of playing and bring a lot of speed onto the square. Since the Mbappe fixed point is no longer there, the offensive team has been considered enormously homogeneous and, above all, unpredictable. Every player is dangerous, every player scores goals.
Ten goals against Brest
And the team wants football and is hungry. This was last shown in the intermediate round when Stade Brest was swept out of the Champions League with a total of 10: 0 goals.
Young players seem to lie better coach Luis Enrique than difficult world stars. An expression of the new way of thinking in Paris is also the fact that the Spaniard has only extended his contract early until 2027 and has been working on the club for almost two years.
Team has a good mix
The squad has an average age of 23.7 years. They still exist, the seasoned professionals and pillars such as Gianluigi Donnarumma, Marquinhos, Achraf Hakimi, Lucas Hernandez, Fabian Ruiz, Ousmane Dembele or Randal Kolo Muani.
Luis Enrique, coach of Paris Saint-Germain
But there are also the young players who make the Enrique team the good mix that it takes to be successful. In defense, for example, this are Willian Pacho (23), who only came from Eintracht Frankfurt in the summer, and the Portuguese Nuno Mendes (22). Warren Zaïre-Emery (18) and Joao Neves (20) pull the threads in midfield. Bradley Barcola (22) and Desire Doue (19) ensure vertebrae on the wings, and center forward Goncalo Ramos is only 23.
Praise from Hütter: “The best PSG”
“This is the best PSG that I’ve seen so far”said only in February coach Adi Hütter of the newspaper “Le Parisie”. With AS Monaco, he had just lost the top game against Paris 1: 4: “They were impressive and much better than we do.”
Paris is still unbeaten in the local Ligue 1. In the Champions League, 15th place was enough for the intermediate round. After defeats against FC Arsenal, Atletico Madrid and Bayern Munich, PSG was even out of the end, but then won the crisis duel against Manchester City and finally made everything clear with a win at VfB Stuttgart.
Still the outsider against Liverpool
In the Champions League, Paris has now won five victories in series. Nevertheless, in the duel with the Liverpool FC is the outsider. The English are the leader of the Premier League, ended the group phase in 1st place and are one of the very big favorites on the title in the premier class.
But even if it shouldn’t work again this year, PSG with its new philosophy, all the young players and Constance on the coaching bench may soon be able to fulfill the dream of the Champions League victory-without any world stars like Messi, Neymar and Mbappe.