PSG look to go one better in Champions League but doubts remain

GBNEWS24 DESK//

Paris Saint-Germain came so close to winning the prize they crave more than anything in last season’s Champions League and are hoping to go one better this time, but there are concerns that the Qatar-owned club might actually have gone backwards in recent months.

Bayern Munich’s greater experience told in Lisbon in August, and there were tears at the end for Neymar as the French champions agonisingly lost 1-0 in their first ever Champions League final, reports AFP.

Two months on, Thomas Tuchel’s side begin their latest bid for European success at home to Manchester United on Tuesday, in a rematch of the last-16 tie in 2019 which PSG lost to a controversial late penalty.

It therefore brings back memories of just one of several painful defeats in the Champions League in recent years, but the reality is that Paris should be considered favourites against the Old Trafford side and to win a group also containing RB Leipzig and Istanbul Basaksehir.

Yet whether this will be the season that they do go all the way remains to be seen.

Tuchel has been the first to complain that his squad is weaker than it was last season as PSG — having already seen several key players depart over the summer — have started the new campaign hamstrung by injuries, suspensions and coronavirus cases.

– ‘Clumsy and rushed’ –

Right-back Thomas Meunier and all-time record goal-scorer Edinson Cavani left when their contracts ended, not even sticking around for the latter stages of the Champions League in August — Cavani is now at United and so could come back to haunt his old side this week.