Question for an eternal contender for victory in the Football Champions League: has Paris-Saint-Germain (PSG) found the magic button as the knockout stages approach? The one on which you just have to put your finger to connect to the current European and find the intensity required to compete with the leaders of the continent? Tuesday February 15, Real Madrid advances to the Parc des Princes and the answer is likely to fall very quickly.
Despite his affection for his first professional club, former midfielder Edouard Cissé has doubts. “Intensity cannot be decreedassures the one who is now an Amazon Prime consultant. Look at Manchester City. They always have this intensity, regardless of the opponent in front. At PSG, players wake up when they are bitten. They are always reacting, but not acting. »
A matter of habit and context perhaps. For a decade, the seasons of PSG version Qatar Sport Investments (QSI) have been looping like the days of Bill Murray’s character in the film An endless day (1993). Minus the snow and the groundhog. Regardless of the results and content of the initial group stage, it all comes down to waiting for February and the thrill of European competition knockout matches. As if the first months did not exist, as if everything was reset.
In this case, it’s probably not so bad. At the time of the draw, on December 13, 2021, Paris offered the spectacle of a team entering hibernation early and without a playing identity. Mauricio Pochettino’s players have had a string of draws – sometimes falling from the sky, like in Lens (1-1), at the beginning of December.
“Rise to Power”
The foundations of the house have some large cracks. The problem is that, more than a year after his arrival, the style of the Argentinian coach does not “print”. Already announced on the departure and even tried to spin in English towards Manchester United in the summer of 2021, according to The Times, the interested party keeps asking for time.
Above all, he ended up assuming the denial of his ideals of play and those of his staff. “They didn’t come looking for us to build a project, asking us what we needed to develop our ideas, or what we like. We came here to adapt and to win.”pleaded the former manager of Tottenham in an interview with The Team, early November 2021.
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