With just 4 points from 4 matches played in Ligue 1 in 2023, PSG are receiving the result of a team fighting relegation rather than a team trying to win their ninth league title since 2012. They suffered a tough win against the bottom team angered (2-0) at Parc des Princes, lost away lens (3-1) and at Rennes (1-0), where the Parisians were overwhelming, and finally last Sunday they drew 1-1 at home to Reims, who beat the champions France and deserves more than a point. .
What is happening? Nothing seems to work anymore, and all the momentum they had before the World Cup is gone.
During the first half of the season, PSG relied heavily on the individual exploits of Lionel Messi (8 goals, 10 assists in Ligue 1), Neymar (12 and 10) and Kylian Mbappé (13 and 2) to save a team that is often too unbalanced and too weak on the good side. Against smaller teams, their talent will eventually show up, but in tough matches, they’ll seem to be waiting for the genius of “MNM” to finally turn the matches in their favor.
A statistic that shows PSG’s biggest weakness: Despite conceding only 0.79 goals per game so far (they have the 4th best defense in Europe’s top 5 leagues and the best defense out of 16). the rest of the team in the Champions League), but they let their opponents take 10.9 shots against them per game (their highest in the last 10 seasons) and create too many chances.
In terms of organization and consistency, it doesn’t matter whether coach Christophe Galtier uses a four-man defender or a five-man defender: The teams leading the league are not tight enough defensively. The pairing of Marquinhos and Sergio Ramos have wobbled frequently this season, struggling to deal with attacks from any opponent PSG have played against. The lack of protection from midfield and the absence of a real defensive player has left the team badly hurt and of course, the lack of defensive effort of the all-star trio up front (although Neymar has pressure) is also a cause. The other eight players on the pitch are hard to take on since the start of the year.
Captain Reims Yunis Abdelhamid explained it well after Sunday’s draw. “It’s easy to play from behind with them. Their forward trio is not defensive. We know that if we get the ball past their forward trio, which is easy, we can hurt. hurt the rest of the team.”
It’s a brutal assessment, but an accurate one. Reims had 17 shots against PSG and easily put them under pressure. They also had no trouble moving the ball and keeping possession against the champions against PSG’s ineffective counter-attack and disorganized defense.
Before the World Cup, MNM was more involved in defense than they had been until 2023. They really wanted to recover the ball as quickly as possible, but that energy was depleted and as a result was left over. of the team is in trouble.
Privately, some in the club have predicted a sharp drop in form after the World Cup considering the number of players involved. Cata and how many PSG players have made it far in the competition, especially Messi (who won with Argentina), Mbappe (lost in the final) and Achraf Hakimi (who is an important part of MarocOthers point out that PSG are not the only major club experiencing a slump after the World Cup: Milan are also going through a bad period, with five points from five Serie A games since restarting. , a result that was soon eliminated from the Coppa Italia and a heavy defeat against rival Inter in the Italian Super Cup.
Bayern Munich are also going through a minor crisis in the Bundesliga – three consecutive 1-1 draws to stay in the league – and Real Madrid also haven’t been great since starting over, losing the Spanish Super Cup first Barcelona. However, PSG’s problems are not just poor form, and coach Galtier is currently under enormous pressure.
Galtier’s latest talking point is about “smugness” from his players, who are “too comfortable”. That may be true, but what has he done and is doing to change that? In terms of gameplay, the team hasn’t been active or developed much for the whole season. Once again, Messi’s personal talent, Marco Verratti, Neymar or Mbappe means that looking at the tree does not see the forest. Behind them there is no cohesion with or without the ball, and that is Galtier’s fault.
On Tuesday, Galtier ruled out removing one of the MNMs from the starting lineup; frankly, he wouldn’t be brave enough to do it even if he thought it was the right move. Instead, he might try a new system of tactics to minimize the imbalance and hopefully ease their weak defenses. After trying many different formations — 3-4-1-2, after 4-3-3, after 4-3-1-2 and after a flat 4-4-2 — he was running out of time to Find the correct formula. For a week, Paris travels in the form of Marseille in the French Cup. In two weeks, they host Bayern Munich in the first leg of the Champions League round of 16, and in between they will visit fourth-place Monaco; after that, yes Lille at home and Marseille away in Ligue 1 before the second leg against Bayern in Germany!
This is not the right time to experiment or find solutions to problems that have always existed. Galtier and his players are at fault as are Luis Campos, the sporting director, who didn’t get the right players last summer — Renato Sanches and Carlos Soler for example, was very bad — and failed to make the acquisitions in January.
The inability to add to the squad in January here is hugely symbolic and in a way it sums up the whole situation at PSG: The club is not doing well at all levels, including including recruitment. Given the problems mentioned above, it’s amazing to think that no new players have arrived.
PSG try to arrange loan of winger Hakim Ziyech and is blaming Chelsea Because wrong document sentwhile Inter did not let defenders Milan Skriniar join now, five months before the end of his contract. Of course, Paris objected to that because they didn’t have much money to spend in January – no more than 20 million euros, according to sources familiar with the matter – but Luis Campos let the club and the team down. able, no matter where the fault lies, to strengthen the team when they need it most.
It looks like a crisis and it looks like a crisis, but it hasn’t exploded yet. However, if they don’t find a way to turn things around quickly – like when PSG marched in Montpellier in Ligue 1 in the middle of this week – it may just be a matter of time.
