Paris Saint-Germain were dumped out of the Champions League at the last-16 stage following a 3-1 defeat to Real Madrid at the Santiago Bernabeu in a game described as a “meltdown” by Ligue 1 journalist Robin Bairner.
Despite a late winner from Kylian Mbappe in the first-leg, and another goal from the Frenchman in the return leg, a Karim Benzema second-half hat-trick condemned Mauricio Pochettino’s side to yet another disappointing Champions League exit.
The Parisians are still yet to win the competition, and recent financial backing, including the world-record signing of Neymar, hasn’t resulted in a change of fortunes.
Robin Bairner, chief editor at FootballTransfers and Ligue 1 journalist for GOAL, spoke exclusively to Park Life Sport about the defeat.
“It was yet another disappointing exit for PSG,” he said. “They obviously looked to be cruising at two-nil up, and with an hour gone they were controlling the game quite nicely. Then they really just got caught by Real Madrid’s increased tempo in the game. Carlo Ancelotti made changes at the break, brought on [Eduardo] Camavinga, and he injected a lot more pace and urgency into the Real Madrid midfield.
“PSG seemed to have weathered the initial storm there, but then [Gianluigi] Donnarumma made a really calamitous error, the sort of mistake that we’ve never really seen from him at the top level before. After that it was a complete mental meltdown from PSG, which we have obviously seen before.”
PSG have been dominant in Ligue 1 over recent years, despite missing out on the title last season, but haven’t translated that into Europe despite their star-studded squad. “The mental scars will only increase after this defeat. Obviously they had issues after Barcelona and then they got this reputation as bottlers, which you can’t really argue with given what’s happened over the years. That’s something I’m going to have to grapple with for a long time to come, and perhaps even until they win the Champions League one day, if they ever get that far.
Bairner added that the late defeat drew comparisons to another famous PSG exit from Europe: “It was very similar to Barcelona and La Remontada [the name given to the 6-1 defeat to Barcelona]. The fall-out in France has suggested that this was perhaps a worse performance or perhaps a worse outcome than what happened in Barcelona five years ago simply because they were so in control.
“If you go back to the Barcelona game five years ago, it was obvious from the start of the match that Barcelona were trying to react from a 4-0 first leg deficit and were really on their game. Whereas last night Real Madrid weren’t really posing too many issues to PSG. PSG were in a phase of the game where they were really quite comfortable only to suffer this incredible meltdown.
The Real Madrid comeback began following Donnarumma’s error in the 61st minute, which was punished by Benzema, who scored his 74th, 75th and 76th Champions League goals. Bairner believes that “it would have actually been a bit healthier for PSG to have conceded a world class opening goal rather than from a mistake like they did, because they’ve simply got these team demons that run through the whole strata of the club.
“There were only two players from La Remontada still playing, but it’s still obvious in this PSG institution that it’s a defeat that really holds a lot of weight in the club and the collective meltdown last night was perhaps a direct result of that.
With the goal of winning the Champions League still yet to be accomplished, question marks have come up regarding PSG’s set-up, and Bairner argues the club needs a refresh. “They basically need a clear-out from the top. That might even include as far as Nasser Al-Khelaifi, the president, and it certainly includes Leonardo, the sporting director.
“I also don’t think the Galactico strategy they’ve adopted was necessarily one that was ever really destined to succeed. Simply because the possibility of tactically building a team around a front free in the modern game is virtually impossible. It’s a long road back from PSG and I think they really need to almost start from the bottom. I’m really not sure that it’s going to be easy for them in the summer, so I think there is a long way back for PSG and it might be one or two years before they’re back and capable of winning the Champions League.”
