PSG: Munich punishes Paris and eliminates PSG from the Champions League

Less than a week before the Oscars ceremony, the scenario has not come out of the overflowing imagination of a strange demiurge. Once again, Paris Saint-Germain have been eliminated from the Champions League. Like last year, Kylian Mbappé’s teammates left the premier competition in Europe in the round of 16. Only the executioner changes: Real Madrid has been succeeded by Bayern Munich. Asphyxiated by the Bavarians, Wednesday March 8, PSG lost in Munich (0-2), without having given the impression of being able to reverse the trend of the first leg (0-1 defeat).

“Unfortunately we have to say that Bayern were stronger than us, admitted the Parisian defender Danilo Pereira after the meeting, at the microphone of Canal +. We made mistakes. It’s hard to go out like that, but it’s the Champions League. We didn’t win many duels. » Among the few Parisian players to have responded this season, Pereira could not find the words to analyze, once again, the ills of his team.

However, Paris did not land in Bavaria by laying down their arms. Urgent, the teammates of Kylian Mbappé, constantly watched by the Bavarian defense, tried to deceive the vigilance of Bayern. But without being frankly dangerous, and taking the risk of being taken from behind by the German arrows. “We had chances in the first half, we didn’t take them. When this is the case in the Champions League, it becomes difficult., said Danilo Pereira. At the end of the first period, midfielder Vitinha rushed to convert an offer from the opposing goalkeeper, Yann Sommer, who offered him the ball after pressing Ashraf Hakimi. But where last year, Karim Benzema with Real Madrid had sanctioned PSG without firing a shot, the young Portuguese midfielder saw his strike repelled by defender Mattijs de Ligt. “Mattijs gives us a great goal, which could have hindered us”noted Kingley Coman, the French winger of Bayern, grateful “a complicated first period” for his own.

Upon returning from the locker room, Julian Nagelsmann’s men reacted. “We showed that we were a team above all”insisted the French defender Dayot Upamecano, questioned by the broadcaster. “We knew it was going to be down to the details. And we scored the first goal with an error from the opponent. » Because unlike Paris, Munich did not hesitate to exploit an opposing offering. And as often against PSG, it was from a former member of the capital club that the penalty came, striker Eric-Maxim Choupo-Moting opening the scoring following a loss of ball from Marco Verratti in the Paris area. “In the second half, we take this really stupid goal. At this level, it is necessary to have a little more lucidity »scolded Christophe Galtier, the Parisian coach, on Canal +.

If Sergio Ramos got two chances, with a header from a corner, at the end of the game, the Bavarians took advantage of the wide spaces opened up by Paris to drive the point home. After several missed opportunities for his own, Serge Gnabry doubled the lead late in the game for Bayern, planting the last nail in the coffin of Parisian hopes.

Despite Kylian Mbappé, well surrounded by the Bavarian rearguard, once again, Paris failed to rise to the height of the opposition of a great European team. Dominated outward and return by Bayern, PSG leaves the queen competition in Europe, after which it has been running since the arrival of the Qatari fund at its head, in 2011. And the balance sheet promises to be salty for the management of the club: despite numerous recruitments over the years, the capital club has been forced to bring in young people trained at the club – in the absence, it is true, of Neymar and many other players. “I don’t know if it’s a lesson to be learned, but it’s a frustration”, concluded Christophe Galtier. Eliminated from the Coupe de France, and now out of the race in the Champions League, the Parisians now only have the championship to try to raise their heads. A scenario that begins to evoke a refrain, year after year.