She’s not gone far, Kyky. – FRANCK FIFE / AFP
- After FC Barcelona, PSG eliminated Bayern Munich on Tuesday evening in the quarter-finals of the Champions League.
- A few months after reaching the final of the competition, the Parisians confirm that they are in the process of acquiring the stature of the greats of Europe.
- In this slow evolution, the outcome of the Neymar files and especially Mbappé will say a lot, at first, about the club that Paris has become.
The impression was already there after the complicated return to Barça in the previous round, it gained further clarity on Tuesday night, when the Parisians were able to let their joy burst out after the stifling last minutes that seemed like hours. It was not so long ago that they would not have come out alive from this end of the game. There is necessarily a ball that would have rebounded on the wrong foot and found the wrong person, Leroy Sané would not have been so wrong in his choices or a Parisian would have made a stupid mistake. We leave the choice to you, but PSG would have been punished for this incredible inability to take cover. But that was before.
By leaving Bayern Munich, a few months after challenging them in the final, PSG confirmed that they were in the process of acquiring the stature of the greats. It will not immunize him against a relapse, a Demba Ba or a Sergi Roberto can always happen, but all the experiences of the last ten years, marked by great victories and terrible disappointments, make him find himself today for the second season in a row in the semi-finals of the Champions League, which no French club had achieved since the reform of the C1 in 1992.
“We are aiming even bigger”, assures Neymar
“The club continues to grow, day by day, year by year, observes titi Presnel Kimpembe. I’m the proof, I struggled to leave after what happened two years ago [sa main qui a précipité l’élimination en 8e de finale contre l’équipe B de Manchester United], but when you fall the important thing is to know how to get up and continue the fight. Tonight [mardi] it was a great fight, even a war, we managed to win it and we are proud of it. “
By dint of experience, the European DNA of the club, which we all had fun, is evolving. “Yes, PSG is a great team, asserts Neymar. We’re in the semi-finals, and we’re aiming even bigger. President Nasser Al-Khelaïfi, at the head of the QSI project from the start, is still in the best position to talk about it.
“This season, we won against Manchester, against Barcelona, against Bayern, which is the best team for me, that means a lot of things, he believes. We are really here, we are among the big clubs. “
But what exactly does a great club recognize? We had spoken about it a little over two years ago, when Paris presented itself before the round of 16 against MU cracked on all floors, to come to the conclusion that it mainly lacked serenity in the moments -keys. “The most important is the stability of the institution and the confidence of the leaders in the project which is carried by the coach”, explained to us in particular a connoisseur of Barça, who saw the club grow step by step.
Pochettino, austerity or serenity?
We can not say that PSG is still a model of all this, with, for example, the very media conflict between Leonardo and Thomas Tuchel, which resulted in the dismissal of the German coach in a timing that was surprising to say the least. The latter did not hide, in the end, his weariness of having to play “sports politician” in a club disturbed by “many influences which go far beyond the interests of the team”.
From this point of view, the appointment of Mauricio Pochettino, a technician able to resist five years to the intransigent boss of Spurs, Daniel Levy, owes nothing to chance. While one could read on the faces of Unai Emery and Thomas Tuchel their mood of the moment and their concerns, the Argentinian does not show any emotion. His press conferences, never cheerful, never alarmist, whatever the adversary or the context, are very often of a desperate flatness for the followers. But no risk, precisely, that it goes all over the place.
On the field side, now, it will have to follow. While waiting to know if this season will take him to the coveted summit, PSG must prepare the following ones. And the project necessarily goes through the two heads of the gondola, Neymar and Kylian Mbappé. The file of their extension, which has been running for many months now, is essential. Their outcome will say a lot about the club that Paris has become.
“We are at an important moment for the club”
This is especially true for the French, who represents more of the future. He will probably not stay his entire career in France, but convincing him to stay another two or three years before going to put on the Real Madrid jersey would be a remarkable feat. This will mean he is leaving because he has been around, not because he believes PSG unable to live up to their ambitions.
Tuesday, hardly the final whistle sounded, Nasser did not go there by four ways. “We can win the Champions League, we can win all the trophies at stake. Kylian and Neymar have no excuses to leave, because we have everything to win here. We are a great team, today, with all respect for the others, we are there with them, ”said the Parisian president at the microphone of RMC Sport.
See the most bankable of the world to leave this summer would not be a definitive stop to the Parisian plan either. But one more slowdown, certainly. “We are at an important moment for the club,” Angel Di Maria summed up Tuesday. Either way, the napkin ring at the Giants’ Table is not yet for tomorrow. “It’s a process that takes time, recalled our regular at Barça. It took patience to make it a club that marks an era. “