When Paris Saint-Germain faced Bayern Munich in the quarter-finals of this season’s Champions League, the football world offered a sympathetic header against Mauricio Pochettino’s side.
You know it. We have all done it involuntarily at one point in our lives, as if we were saying ‘there things will get better one day, just stick to the old guy’.
Kylian Mbappe and co. had other ideas.
The French champions threatened to run away with the tie at one point and stormed into a 2-0 lead when the Allianz Arena began to look as if someone had switched to winter mode at FIFA.
Die Roten managed to retreat to the competition – an effort led by Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting’s brilliance as the former Stoke man proved to be twice as good as usual first-choice frontman Robert Lewandowski – although Mbappe ultimately had the last word.
The Frenchman left Jerome Boateng and looked like a parody of Paul Alcock shortly after being shot in the chest by Paolo Di Canio (if you have no idea what we’re going out for), stumbles back like Bambi before watching helpless as Mbappe fired his second part of the game beyond Manuel Neuer to give PSG the lead halfway through the tie.
Two goals from Kylian Mbappe, two Neymar assists and plenty of entertainment in the snow ❄️
Bayern 2-3 PSG in 60 seconds! ⏱️ pic.twitter.com/K8HjtwFx2z
– Football on BT Sport (@btsportfootball) April 8, 2021
We really should not have been shocked by the 3-2 score given Les Parisien’s ridiculously talented squad, but such has been Bavaria’s dominance both nationally and continental over the last 12 months, it was hard not to be surprised by PSG’s triumph.
Bayern have plenty of time to turn around deficits in the first leg – something the club’s official Twitter account was quick to recall before Tuesday night’s clash – and in truth they should be much better equipped to face Pochettino’s men at the Parc des Princes. than a little over a week ago.
Hansi Flick’s side defended like a team that had never seen a minute of PSG’s deadly front line in action during their first leg defeat and assumed a ridiculously high line when Neymar and Mbappe ran riot.
The German champions seemed to learn their lesson when the competition continued, but they were caught in the counterattack with only 20 minutes to play when they pressed for a winning goal, when Mbappe blew ready to give his side the win.
The Flick men will of course be desperate to catch the game’s first goal on Tuesday night when they want to book their place in the last four of the competition, but they must be careful with the fast PSG counter, and last week’s defeat should have taught them that they can not afford to just flood forward and leave their backline exposed.
Aside from their naive defensive display, there really wasn’t much wrong with Bayern’s performance at the Allianz Arena last week.
Flick’s side dominated the possession and collected a total of 31 shots on goal compared to the guests’ six – the game was simply dependent on PSG being the more ruthless of the two teams.
Without Lewandowski leading the line, Bayern are of course a much less productive team than when the Polish hitman is in shape and available for selection, but Die Roten took enough chances in the first stage to know that PSG’s backline can be used.
Hansi Flick’s side must learn its lessons from the first stage with PSG | Matthias Hangst / Getty Images
Individual errors also worsened Bavaria’s performance, with Neuer fumbling Mbappe’s first effort of the night in the back of the net – an error probably caused by the Bavarian snowstorm that both sides were trying to play through.
If Bayern want to advance to the semi-finals of this season’s Champions League, they must be better at scoring goals, better at not conceding goals and hoping it does not snow … what about a hot shot?
But seriously, there is still a lot of life left in this tie. If Bayern have learned their lessons from the previous meeting with PSG, there is no reason at all why they can not roll over their deficit with a goal from the first stage, and with a perfect defensive performance you would not bet against Die Roten who surpasses PSG and advances to the semifinals.
