For the tenth consecutive year, Paris Saint-Germain have found a way to fill their trophy cabinet even more. A year after losing its place on the throne of French football, beaten by Lille, the capital club made sure to recover its status as national champion on Saturday April 23, after its draw at the Parc des Princes against Lens during the 34th day (1-1). A tenth coronation in Ligue 1 which allows him to equal Saint-Etienne, the only club before him to have reached this total in the history of French football.
A historic event which, in another context, could have served to erase the affront of the previous year and lead to scenes of jubilation, especially since it comes four games from the actual end of the season. But in front of their audience, Mauricio Pochettino’s players chose sobriety at the final whistle, after letting the victory slip away from them against an opponent yet reduced to ten against eleven.
The day before, the coach had called on the supporters to take communion in the event of consecration, like a bottle thrown into the sea so that the party would be there, a week after the strike of the ultras during the Classic PSG-OM: “I hope that if we win the title, our fans will celebrate with us and that there will be a good atmosphere in the stadium.“In response, Collectif Ultras Paris (CUP) had called on Parisian fans to gather outside the stadium in the 75th minute, in front of the Auteuil bend,”to celebrate the end of a season in which only the supporters were up to it.“The stadium was also completely empty, barely ten minutes after the final whistle.
Since the painful elimination in the round of 16 of the Champions League against Real Madrid (1-0, 1-3), on March 9, the rupture has been consummated between the club, with its ambitions never satisfied, and its supporters. One more humiliation that broke the camel’s back. “For too long now the club offers us a face that we no longer support“, had then written the CUP at the start of a scathing press release.
Yesterday’s victory does not alter our anger!!!@PSG_inside pic.twitter.com/OYjkqAiX2x
– Collective Ultras Paris (@Co_Ultras_Paris) February 7, 2022
The fact of having saved his season, with this early coronation in Ligue 1, will paradoxically only serve to highlight the depth of the fracture. The only player to have always escaped criticism, and this since his arrival in 2013, captain Marquinhos thought that the revolt would end at least on the evening of the Classic against OM and did not appreciate the encouragement strike of April 17 . “They have their arguments. They made their choice, but as a player, I don’t agree. We had to leave pride and pride aside tonight“, he had dropped at the microphone of Prime Video. “These are things I don’t understand. I know they were disappointed for Madrid, but we have to move on“, added Marco Verratti on Saturday evening.
Never has a season for PSG aroused so much excitement. The contrast between the fanfare arrival of Lionel Messi in August, and this gloomy spring is striking. The 2021-2022 season is not technically over, but it will ultimately remain as one of disappointment, crystallized by the failure to harness the full potential of its tantalizing attacking trio, the famous “MNM” (Messi-Neymar- Mbappe). The candy did not taste as expected.
Under the leadership of Mauricio Pochettino, it is as if PSG had stolen its magic from one of the greatest players in the history of football. Some will object that Lionel Messi is no longer the same player at 34 and that this did not prevent him from delivering 13 assists. Nevertheless, his four small goals scored in 28 Ligue 1 games are a task, knowing that he was coming out of a season with 30 goals in La Liga with Barça. The beauty of the last, catapulted into the skylight of Jean-Louis Leca, will not be enough to overshadow the rest of his season.
Performances that stand out even more next to the exceptional season of Kylian Mbappé, directly involved in almost half of his team’s achievements in the league (36/75) and left to finish both top scorer and top passer in Ligue 1 The shame for PSG is to have witnessed such fireworks even though the 2018 world champion, at the end of his contract in June, could leave the capital this summer. The more Mbappé shone, the more the supporters of the capital club were able to measure the abyss he could leave in the event of departure. Difficult to profit in the face of so many uncertainties.
The paradoxes do not end there. This season Paris will have hooked Manchester City and Real on its list of hunters at the Parc des Princes in the Champions League. While these two clubs will face each other on April 26 for a place in the final of the competition, the Parisians have had nothing to play for almost two months. This PSG 2021-2022 will also have been able to make one of the cleanest copies in its history in C1 at home against Madrid (1-0), a month after falling in the round of 16 of the Coupe de France, against Nice at the end. of an evening without ideas (0-0, 5-6 tab).
The more PSG puts in the means to finally win this cursed Champions League, the higher it falls and the more the idea of a fatality specific to the capital club materializes. A bit like Sisyphus, condemned to climb the slope each time he tries to push his rock to the top of his unstable mountain.