Paris Saint-Germain had a Wiebel against Aston Villa, but they came through a heavy investigation and Luis Enrique believes that they will be stronger for it. They remain the favorites to win the Champions League. To you, Kylian Mbappe.
With PSG well placed to be the first French side in more than 30 years to eliminate the trophy, this is an uncomfortable time for Mbappe. He threatens to be the man who has joined the current champions of Europe to discover that he left the next champions in Europe.
Poor enough in itself, but worse if enough claim that the power shift from Madrid to Paris is partially facilitated by his movement in the opposite direction. Only a comeback for the centuries by Real Madrid against Arsenal would change the story.
Even when losing 3-2 from Villa in the night, enough to claim 5-4, PSG showed why the opposition captain John McGinn rated them as the best team he has ever had to deal with. Technically excellent and full of pace, they punish them in different ways.
“Of course we are a team that attacks a low block,” said Luis Enrique afterwards. “But we are even better when there is room.” Their two goals came to the counterattack. But the teamwork also stands out and sticks to it in the midst of the attack.
It is the story of a team that perhaps lost the best player in the world, but has found something in the process. For Luis Enrique it is a justification. He not only believed that he could improve PSG once Mbappe had left, he had told everyone exactly.
“I was very brave last season when I told you that we would have a better team in attack and defense,” said the former Barcelona coach in February. “I still think we are better at attack and defense, the figures are there to say it. The players took it as a challenge.”
PSG has already created more great opportunities in Ligue 1 than in one of the previous five seasons – with six games to go. “I told you that instead of having a player who scores 40 goals, I wanted players who all score a lot.” That is what happened.
Ousmane Dembele, scorer of only three league goals last season, has 21 in the competition this time and 29 General. Bradley Barcola has weighed 16, Desire Done scored eight. In Moneyball terms they have generally replaced Mbappe.
But the more harmful message this sends from the perspective of Mbappe is what can be achieved when everyone is also able to defend the work. It was a point that Luis Enrique worked last season – the most memorable recorded in the documentary images.
“You first have to set that example as a person and as a player by going to the press,” said the PSG coach, who begged Mbappe to take his defensive responsibilities seriously, in an attempt to convince him by emphasizing that Michael Jordan had done it in basketball.
“And go back so quickly,” Luis Enrique continued. “Why? To be a leader. Because you think you only have to score goals. Of course you are a world phenomenon, a player of top class – no doubt about it, but that doesn't work for me,” he said ominously.
“A real leader is when you can't help us with the goals … You help us with everything related to defensive tasks,” he added, before he summarizes by concluding: “If … you set yourself as an example to print, do you know what we have? A F ***** team machine.”
Luis Enrique has that now. It was well illustrated when Doue returned to conclude a villa break during the first stage in Paris. In the game in Villa Park there was some backs-to-the-wall defense, but there was also a lot of defending from the front to be done.
Mbappe never really understood that. Perhaps he has reached too early to be convinced of the need. Understandable when you pushed Monaco to the title at the age of 18, won a world cup while you are still a teenager and then scored a hat trick in the next final.
Presumably winning the Champions League – and the Ballon d'Or could accompany it – is something that Mbappe is rather enthusiastic about. It was one of the reasons to become a member of the 15-way Champions of Europe. Now it's a matter of actually doing it.
For Carlo Ancelotti it is the ultimate problem in the first world to have Mbappe supported on him, but this is a coach who has made a career by making the components fit. Nevertheless, adjusting a team that had just won the Champions League is a management test.
Mbappe itself is sharp enough to appreciate the complications. “My arrival has changed many things in the team.” Asked to play more centrally, even though he is not a natural back-to-target player, he would prefer the positions that Vinicius Junior Frequents takes.
It is possible that it is the Brazilian who ultimately has to continue, but in the meantime Ancelotti tries to accommodate the front three of last season with Mbappe for the company. It means that Jude Bellingham moves deeper, also adjusting Rodrygo.
Against Arsenal, unlike the willing forward runners of PSG, Madrid wore a few passengers defensive and it cost them. The first two goals came from Declan Rice Free-Kicks, but attempts to put the result away were not convincing.
Madrid knows that they are now easier to play. What seemed like a fudge last season, in which Bellingham played between Vinicius and Rodrygo, now looks like a relative template for success, after they have won the Champions League and regained Leafa.
Compare the team that won the trophy in Wembley in June with the one that was well defeated by Arsenal on the other side of North Londs. In Simplistic terms, Mbappe arrived for Dani Carvajal, while others, including Fede Valverde, have to switch back.
It has made them vulnerable. Mbappe has still scored goals, many of them. There are some signs of understanding with Bellingham. If it clicks, it can be nice, but there are no guarantees. And yet, because this is Madrid, the belief in a potential comeback continues to exist.
If that feels imaginative, it seems more an urgent need for Mbappe. His horror -tail in the game against Alaves at the weekend, for which he was sent away, suggests that a player who was used to bending matches to his will feels pressure on him to deliver.
It is 16 years since Zlatan Ibrahimovic Inter left for Barcelona, then the ruling champions of Europe, only for the Italian side not to stand out alone, but to win themselves. At the moment, Mbappe is only folding to make the reunion date.
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