With pressure mounting, what's going wrong at PSG?
A lack of identity on the pitch, FIVE defeats in the new year, and one foot out of the Champions League after defeat to Bayern Munich – with pressure mounting on Christophe Galtier’s shoulders, what’s going wrong at PSG?
- PSG’s lead at the top of Ligue 1 may slip to two points if they lose versus Marseille
- The French titans have suffered five defeats in all competitions so far in 2023
- Xavi reveals he is keeping in ‘constant contact’ with PSG forward Lionel Messi
For a side often accused of walking their domestic competitions, PSG seem intent on making their pursuit of a staggering ninth Ligue 1 title in 11 years as difficult as possible, judging by their start to 2023.
In the last eight campaigns they have finished the league season with five losses or fewer on seven occasions. Les Parisiens have now lost five games in all competitions in the last two months alone, and the cracks are beginning to show in the relationship between the squad and the hierarchy.
PSG are out of the Coupe de France – which they’ve won a record 14 times – and already have one foot out of the Champions League that they are so desperate to win after a disappointing 1-0 home defeat to Bayern Munich in the last 16. They now face a trip on Sunday to the Marseille team that knocked them out the cup, and can cut their lead at the top to just two points.
Christophe Galtier has been hampered by injuries to each of Lionel Messi, Kylian Mbappe and Neymar at some point during the first two months of 2023. However, he is far from absolved of any blame given his repeated experimentation with the side and inability to find the right tactical plan to suit his litany of stars.
An inability to strengthen the squad in January compounds a host of issues both on and off the field at a club that seems only a few more poor decisions from implosion. Here, Sportsmail takes a look at just what is going wrong at PSG after their torrid start to the year.
Christophe Galtier’s side have lost five games in all competitions in 2023 – more than the entire league campaign last season
The French side are out of the cup, have one foot out of the Champions League and can see their lead at the top of Ligue 1 slip to two points this weekend
WOEFUL FORM TO KICK OFF THE YEAR
The most glaring problem that this titanic club is facing is a very poor run of form in what is turning out to be a crucial point in their season.
There are very few teams that can waltz their way to a title bereft of challenges, but PSG have been off the boil for two months now, with their two left feet leaving them at risk of fumbling a competition they have utterly dominated.
PSG’s reign at the top of Ligue 1 has drawn snide comments from football purists over the validity of winning a competition after so heavily out-spending your competitors, but failing to win after splashing out is surely even far worse.
And now that is exactly the barrel PSG are staring down, for the second time in three seasons. PSG are a club used to winning almost without hitting fifth gear.
Or even third sometimes, if you look at the numbers, but there are signs that the previous method of simply buying the biggest names in the game seems to be catching up with them.
In their last six winning campaigns they have won by more than 10 points on five occasions, including a ridiculous 31-point buffer in 2015-16.
And although they looked set for another comfortable year before the World Cup with Mbappe, Messi and Neymar all bursting through defences on a whim, the picture has drastically changed now.
Just five points separate Les Parisiens from Marseille, who dominated them in a 2-1 win in the French Cup earlier in February, and the hostile Stade Velodrome will be exactly where Galtier does not want to take his limping side in order to turn their season around.
Even when they have won, it has not been pretty, which at other times we might suggest highlights the credentials of a side that will go all the way, but in PSG’s case it belies a group that are having to pull out all the stops to overcome challenges that they would previously have swatted away with ease.
Once again, Mbappe, Neymar and Messi were the difference in a 4-3 comeback win over Lille last time out, sealed in injury time. The 2-0 win over bottom-of-the-pile Angers does not tell the true story of a difficult win, and two cup wins over minnows Chateauroux and Pays de Cassel are in effect nothing more than vanity boosters.
PSG have started the new year off in poor form with only five wins from 12 games and one draw
Galtier won the league with Lille in 2020-21 but has struggled at times over the campaign
Galtier himself has spoken of his side being ‘too comfortable’ and prone to ‘complacency’ – is that not an admission from the manager himself that his methods are not reaching his squad?
PSG now face a big three games that will decide their season; after Marseille this weekend they host a Nantes side that were knocked out of the Europa League by Juventus on Thursday, before the trip to Bavaria for a place in the quarter-finals of the Champions League.
Anything less than three wins and Galtier could see his side out of a second competition and behind in the race for a third. Where all three of those wins come from, though, relies heavily on Galtier at last getting his tactics right.
GALTIER CAN’T GET TACTICS RIGHT
There is no denying that PSG have a squad saturated with star quality. A front three that contains seven Ballon d’Ors, a World Cup, four Champions Leagues – as well as world-beaters Mbappe and Neymar – is not to be taken lightly. But football is more than a three-person game, and PSG just can’t get it right at the moment.
Make no mistake – Galtier is an astute tactician who has a history of tailoring his tactics to his team.
But the flexibility with which he artfully flitted from a 4-3-3, to a 4-2-3-1 and a 4-4-2 at Saint-Etienne – taking them from relegation contenders to top-four finishers – and Lille – where he won a shock Ligue 1 crown – looks to have deserted him.
Now Galtier looks rooted to the spot in his search for some tactical versatility with his new side. In just the last five games alone, we’ve seen attempts at a 4-3-1-2, 4-4-2, 3-5-2 and a 4-1-3-2. Rather than an enviable and untraceable adaptability, PSG are now a team without a cohesive identity – short of ‘give it to the dynamic front three’.
Oscillating between a three- and four-person defensive unit can hardly bring solidity in the rearguard. Although no side in the Champions League last 16 had conceded fewer goals per game by February than the French side, their opponents average almost 11 shots per game – a club-worst in the last 10 years.
The attacking quality that Galtier has at his disposal is undeniable but the front three are absent defensively
With a three-person unit Galtier has sought to get the best out of ball-players Sergio Ramos and Presnel Kimpembe, while allowing the effervescent Achraf Hakimi to get forward and impact the game but in reality, a back three has largely served to highlight an overall inability to actually defend the ball this season.
The lack of a truly world-class defensive midfielder in front of an obviously wobbly defence does not help.
Marco Veratti’s brilliance is clear, but his talents in progressing the play are nullified by the deficiencies of Vitinha, Danilo Pereira and Carlos Soler. Look how Casemiro has transformed Manchester United – there is no similarly capable counterpart in the side.
To make matters worse, the front three are absent for much of the game without the ball, although to his credit Neymar has at least made an effort to inject some urgency to the press.
But a concerted press is one of the key defences in modern football – think of Liverpool’s previously all-conquering triumvirate of Mohamed Salah, Sadio Mane and Roberto Firmino that papered over the cracks in the centre of the park. That is precisely the opposite of what Mbappe, Neymar and Messi are producing.
Galtier cannot drop any of the three crowning glories at the club – nor would he be likely to even if he could – which leaves him hamstrung for selection. He needs greater protection for his defence, but to pick three men in midfield, he would have to commit to a back four.
PSG’s defence have been exposed in both a back three and a four-person defensive unit
SQUAD-BUILDING WOES
Linked to Galtier’s inability to come up with an answer to the on-pitch conundrum, PSG’s squad-building in recent campaigns has been nothing short of a woeful tribute act to the Galacticos ethos they are so desperate to implement.
Florentino Perez’s infamous policy was, for the record, not quite as successful as the emphatic name suggests, winning just one LaLiga between 2002 and 2006, but PSG’s attempt to replicate it has seen piles of money invested in the wrong areas.
That’s not to say that all their business has been misguided – signing Gianluigi Donnarumma and Messi on free deals stand out – but the continued failure to bring in a world-beating midfielder and a centre-back that would remind Ramos of what he used to be capable of in his youth are crippling the side.
So much so that even a cluster of players, led by Presnel Kimpembe, Neymar and Marquinhos, are reported to be feeling the side has been ‘weakened’ by poor investment – with the likes of Idrissa Gueye and Leandro Paredes allowed to leave, only to be replaced by Vitinha, Soler and Fabian Ruiz.
The squad is in dire need of an overhaul. It is littered with deadwood, and punctuated with players enjoying the twilight years of their careers and lacking a truly recognisable core.
Mbappe is obviously the poster-boy of the side, and alongside Hakimi, Hugo Ekitike, Donnarumma, Kimpembe, Ruiz and Nuno Mendes there is a young side that can be built.
Even the jewels in the ever-rusting crown are not without flaw. The hopes of the club’s season lie with an undeniably all-time great who turns 36 this year, Neymar, who is now out with his seventh ankle injury, and an Mbappe that seems to decide the course of each move the club makes based on his mood.
The rumours of strife between Mbappe and Neymar never seem to go away and the latter is now being touted for an exit despite a massive contract of his own until 2027. Whenever there is any controversy surrounding one, the fingers seem to automatically point to the other, as happened with McDonald’s-gate recently.
It looks as if the Frenchman is set to win out in that particular battle. And with Messi still to agree to a new deal – if one is even on the table – PSG are set for a massive and likely expensive search for a new front line next term.
Even an admission that Messi or Neymar is leaving at the end of the season would surely be better than the lingering uncertainty.
Kylian Mbappe and Neymar are thought to have a very tense relationship at the club
Florentino Perez’s ‘Galacticos‘ policy saw Real Madrid sign one world-class player every year
PROBLEMS WITH THE HIERARCHY
There is little that the hierarchy in Paris can now do to help their side find a way past a Bayern side unbeaten at home in the Champions League since April 2021 – a defeat to none other than PSG. The issues at the club are symptomatic of a greater disease.
With Leonardo ousted after Mbappe’s new deal at the club, Galtier was paired up once again with Luis Campos, who was sporting director at Lille at the start of their stunning title-winning campaign.
And although it proved a fruitful partnership for the club in the long run, it has not had quite the impact that PSG were hoping for. Galtier’s biggest task when taking over was dealing with egos – one he appears to be failing in massively.
He and Campos did it at Lille together, but with credit, PSG is a completely different kettle of fish. And those fish likely have far more fragile and inflated egos.
Rather than bring a measured and calculated hand that a figure with his history as an analyst might promise, Campos has already been involved in heated flare-ups with key members of the squad.
After the defeat to Monaco, he waded into the training room and accused the players of a lack of aggression, according to reports, which didn’t sit well with Neymar, who is thought to have told Campos: ‘It’s not up to you to talk to me, you’re not my coach’.
A loose cannon for a football advisor – his ominously vague job title – is hardly the steersman needed at a club so riddled with issues. Campos failed to deliver in January, with the club not strengthening where necessary despite a relatively small budget reported to be around £17.5m.
The club failed to lure Milan Skriniar to Paris with just five months on his contract at Inter, and the fingers continue to be pointed at Chelsea over the loan deal to get Hakim Ziyech.
It would seem that through poor management, PSG have amassed quite the to-do list if they are to have any hope of turning things around any time soon.
Neymar and Luis Campos had a dressing-room disagreement after the defeat to rivals Monaco
Football advisor Campos was present on the touchline in PSG’s recent 4-3 win over Lille
PSG are reportedly being linked with a shock move for their former manager Thomas Tuchel
Tuchel, who was sacked by PSG on Christmas Eve in 2020, is ready to return to coaching
Top of the list is deciding what to do with Neymar, trying to tie Messi down to a new contract, improving results on the pitch, identifying the problem areas in the squad and actually acting on them, and helping their manager control the players at his disposal.
And then there’s the manager himself – when does time run out for Galtier? On the surface of it, he’s still at the top of Ligue 1, he’s won the Trophee des Champions, and he’s not out of Europe just yet. But he looks to be out of his depth with this team – a team for whom the Champions League is the only real barometer of success.
There are very few instances in which a club would take the sizable PR hit and embarrassment of appointing a former manager, but with rumours swirling over a shock return for Thomas Tuchel, it looks as if the French giants are beginning to consider that option, if Campos’ presence on the touchline for the 4-3 comeback against Lille is anything to judge by.
The club is shrouded in a dense mist of uncertainty that has taken up position above the futures of Neymar, Messi and Galtier – putting an end to the questions are the first step that the club must take if they are to move forward.
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