This post now makes it back-to-back posts about a similar topic - but in both cases, the main talking point is the same that it’s been for years with no end in sight.
The first leg of one of this season’s Champions League semifinals saw Borussia Dortmund at home against Paris Saint-Germain. The narratives surrounding both clubs heading into the match could not have been more different. With this run to the semifinals, Dortmund were already playing with house money. Almost nobody expected the Schwarzgelben to have made it this far.
In contrast, PSG arrived in the semifinals with a reputation as European football’s perennial chokers. This was just the third time over the past 12 seasons that the Parisian club had made the final four of European football’s showpiece tournament; on top of that, they had been knocked out in the round of 16 in five of the last seven seasons. Heading into the match as favorites to reach the final, this was PSG’s chance to silence the doubters and for once actually rise to the occasion under the greatest pressure.
Instead, PSG once again did “PSG things”. A PSG team that should’ve, at least on paper, been too much for their German opponents to handle succumbed to a 1-0 loss and have one foot out of the tournament’s exit door. Niclas Füllkrug’s first-half goal put Dortmund one draw away from the club’s third-ever Champions League final and first since losing to arch-rivals Bayern Munich in 2013.
Despite the expected skill gap between both teams, almost no one was even slightly surprised by this result. It seems as though every year, PSG find new ways to snatch defeat from the jaws of victory. Not even adding the greatest player who’s ever lived could do anything to help - in fact, when Leo Messi played at the Parc des Princes, PSG’s “aura” somehow managed to “infect” Messi in what proved to be the only significant blot on the GOAT’s career.
On top of that, it must be kept in mind that the only season in which PSG made it to the final was the 2019-20 campaign. This, of course, was the season interrupted by Covid-19 and its associated lockdowns. Thus, that season’s Champions League became a single-elimination tournament instead of having the two-legged fixtures which typically feature throughout the knockout rounds. Add to that the pandemic restrictions that kept crowds away from stadiums and it makes even more sense - PSG would only be able to reach the final in outlier circumstances. Had that season’s Champions League proceeded as per usual, it’s almost certain that PSG wouldn’t have made the final.
To make matters worse, this season is club icon Kylian Mbappé’s last at PSG; he will sign for Real Madrid during the coming off-season. Considering the fact that PSG are likely to fade into irrelevance without Mbappé on board, this was likely PSG’s last chance to make a serious Champions League title push. A match which PSG should’ve approached with the mindset of “it’s now or never - we have to make this count” while being expected to win without too much difficulty ought to have been a scenario that played into their favour. But of course, it was the same thing that happens just about every single year.
Despite the billions that PSG’s Qatari owners have poured into the club and all the stars that have come and gone over that time, once again: “PSG gonna PSG”. In fact, at this point PSG’s history of chokes on the big stage hangs over the club like a dark cloud. Even their quarterfinal comeback victory over Barcelona needed a red card on Barça defender Ronald Araújo in order to happen.
A team with PSG’s roster would usually be expected to overturn the one-goal deficit in the second leg and make it to the final at Wembley. However, with Paris Saint-Germain, it’s a case of “they were who we thought they were”. Virtually no one apart from the club’s staunchest homers expects them to do so - and for good reason. Likely getting knocked out of the tournament by a team some didn’t even expect to make it out of the group stage will be the latest entry on PSG’s illustrious Champions League lowlight reel.
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