Psg-Lyon 1-1, goals from Paqueta and Kehrer. Two Mbappé poles

Without Messi or Donnarumma, PSG returns with a point from Lyon. And it can go well given how the game was going, with the immediate advantage of Paqueta and a winning strategy from the home team. It took the Parisian club 75 minutes to figure it out. Not with Mbappé, censored by two poles, nor with Icardi, who is completely transparent, but with central Kehrer, who entered five minutes earlier.

Strategy

–

Messi remained at home, physically short, after Covid which forced Donnarumma to isolate himself. Beyond the absences, including that of Neymar who will return only at the end of the month, the PSG went immediately under. The advantage, in front of only 5 thousand spectators, bears the noble signature of Paquetà, and it is all deserved. Lyon, in deep crisis given the standings (13 / o before the kick-off, with only 24 points), takes the field with the right attitude. And also with clear ideas. And simple. Pressing Parisians is useless. Better to wait for them. And so Lyon remains low, tightens the three lines of 3-5-2 and puts pressure only in the median. The idea is to recover useful balls. Like the one on Paredes at 8 ‘that Guimaraes uses with a deep throw for Paquetà. The former Rossoneri enters the area and from the right shoots the surgical diagonal that passes Navas.

Poles

–

The hosts’ tactical plan also prevents Mbappé from finding useful spaces, keeping the anonymous Icardi at bay. But it is the Frenchman who becomes dangerous at the end with a right-footed turn, from a standstill, which splinters the opposite post (42 ‘). And by hitting a second in the 37th minute, on a calibrated free kick, which would have definitively unbalanced the game, given that the PSG had already found equal. With Kehrer, cold in the thrust from the right, receiving a ball from the left by the young Michut from Xavi Simons. Both of 2003, entered with the German in the 26th minute. Enough to avoid a misstep that would have put Pochettino into question even more, who will play everything in the Champions League, starting from the second round with Real Madrid, in mid-February.