Mauricio Pochettino appeared at a press conference after the resounding 3-0 win over Bordeaux, bottom of the Ligue 1 table, and he did not avoid the subject of the abundant whistles that both Messi and Neymar received, in addition to the team in general. The only one who was saved was Mbappé, who performed well in the Champions League elimination at the hands of Real Madrid.
“I took the context with sadness. I think all of us who love PSG share this feeling, with the pain of elimination. I am sad for what I experienced today”, expressed the DT about the boos. And he added: “We have all been affected. We understand the disappointment and frustration. We experience this together, as a team. We have a responsibility to take responsibility for what happened and we share the fans’ disappointment.”
Finally, in a more than brief conference, he explained that he was very satisfied with the recovery that the group had and the positive result that it achieved after the very hard elimination suffered: “We are satisfied with today’s reaction in a difficult context and against a difficult team. We are all affected, we feel disappointment and frustration. We are responsible, but we must assume the next objectives. Today we were looking for the three points and we got them”.
The goals of the match
A bit of French (dis)love
The blow in Madrid still hurts in Paris. The elimination against Real in the round of 16 of the Champions League, after having arrived with a 1-0 lead in the first leg and after Kylian Mbappé’s goal in the first half of the second leg, gave a team another slap in the face full of stars, who had 150 minutes in the series in which he dominated Merengue, but who paid dearly for his mistakes in the last half hour and was eliminated.
The fall generated a new rupture between the players and the fans, who once again suffered the curse of the Champions League, and a true karma for the Parisian team. And that rupture was felt for much of the 90 minutes in the Parc des Princes. Not even the 3-0 victory against Bordeaux calmed – at least temporarily – the fury of the fans, who targeted the entire squad, but with the main focus on Neymar and Lionel Messi himself. Only Mbappé, author of PSG’s two goals in the series against Merengue, was spared the generalized whistles and boos.
And on top of that, in this hostile climate, which began even in the warm-up, PSG started suffering, with two clear chances from Bordeaux, the last in Ligue 1, in the first minute of the match. In both cases, Keylor Navas responded to save the team. It should be noted that the Costa Rican did not play against Real Madrid and precisely his replacement, Gianluigi Donnarumma, was the protagonist in Karim Benzema’s first goal with a blunder at the start that caused people to talk.
Controlling the ball, but still without depth, PSG leveled the game as the minutes went by against a Bordeaux that gradually gave up ground and the ball, but did not stop threatening. Calmness only came at 24 and, when not?, from the feet of Kylian Mbappé. The only one recognized by the public, among so many whistles, responded again and made it 1-0, after a good triangulation between Messi, Wijnaldum and the Frenchman.
Without much else, with good flashes from Mbappé and La Pulga, who is worth noting that he had a good game again like in Spain, halftime came and a new cataract of boos from the stands.
In the second half, the best of PSG was seen in a burst of that game and those connections that are so requested from Mauricio Pochettino’s team. Most of them, with Messi as the protagonist. Because it was the Flea who leaked for Achraf Hakimi, who then threw the center into the middle for Neymar to push it. A Neymar who, defiantly, chose not to shout the goal. After kicking the ball hard against the goal again, he just hugged his teammates.
As we said, it was a burst from PSG because a clear penalty arrived a few minutes later, which the referee finally did not penalize due to a previous offside and then a new relief for Messi and company, with a nice definition by Leandro Paredes after several rebounds in the area.
The victory and the win do not cover the great disappointment of the fans and the players themselves and it does not seem more than a consolation prize, especially in a Ligue 1 that, 10 dates from the closing and with PSG leading 15 points behind their escort It already looks practically cooked. And of course, from the stands, they reminded him again with a new general boo as soon as the referee marked the end of the game.
But, beyond the fact that nothing and no one is going to erase last Wednesday’s blow, it is a victory that restores behind closed doors, a much-needed victory to leave behind the impact of elimination and to give Pochettino one more life. The title that is heading for PSG would leave it as the most successful team in France, but not even that seems to calm the fury of the fans who are still waiting for the Orejona, the great pending account.
