by Paris Saint-Germain came to the Club World Cup as a newly crowned champion in Europe, but a meeting with the Inter Miami von Lionel Messi in the last 16 reminds of memories of more unfortunate times for the French club.
PSG’s breathtaking 5-0 demolition by Inter Milan in Munich at the end of the last month, which made it possible for them to win the UEFA Champions League for the first time, completed an incredible season for the team backed by Qatar under the coaching of Luis Enrique.
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It is no coincidence that PSG has reached its crowning fame in its first season after having definitely switched off their focus from the commitment of Superstar players to work instead a brilliant coach with a hungry, dynamic young team.
Kylian Mbappes move to Real Madrid a year ago followed the departures in 2023 by Neymar, the most expensive signing in the world when he joined in 2017, and Messi was appointed in the same summer -Luis -enrique.
When PSG fell in August 2021 to sign Messi after a Barcelona Barcelona was unable to keep it, the French team logically believed the Argentine the man who could provide a difficult to grasp Champions League-Ruhm.
Messi, who was 34 years old at the time, thought the same thing.
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“My dream is to win another Champions League, and I think I’m in the ideal place to have this chance and do it,” he said in his unveiling.
Unfortunately, it did not work out in Messi’s first season in Paris, under which compatriot Mauricio Pochettino in 2021/22 or in the next campaign under Christophe Galter.
PSG was a semi-finals for the Champions League final and then in the two seasons before Messi’s arrival, so he looked like the last piece in the puzzle.
Instead, they went backwards with him in the side and have assumed the Europe Elite Club competition in the past 16 years.
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– Everything is not forgiven – –
In Messi – with its estimated annual salary of 30 million euros (35.2 million US dollars) after taxes – as well as in Neymar and Mbappe, it may have increased the star appell, but it weakened it as a team.
Towards the end, the Barcelona legend was even mocked by a few sections of the PSG support, which Messi’s commitment did not feel for the matter that it should have been.
Messi was a PSG player when he inspired Argentina in Qatar in Qatar at the end of 2022, but in France there was only lightning of his genius on the club level.
His statistics vote with 32 goals and 35 templates in 75 appearances of a review and he won two titles of the Ligue 1, while contributing to increase the value of PSG as a brand.
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But a memorable quote of a columnist in French sport daily L’Equipe has summarized things.
“Psg was no better than before … and he seemed as much a wish to play in Ligue 1 as he was to go to the dentist,” wrote Vincent Duuluc.
Almost striker two years and Messi enjoys the dusk of his career in the Major League Soccer with Inter Miami, the team that he qualified for the KO level of this Club World Championship.
Fate therefore organized a last showdown with PSG in the same stadium in Atlanta on Sunday, where he achieved a wonderful free kick last week to achieve a 2-1 win against Porto.
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“Everything is not forgiven,” said the front page of L’Equipe in France on Friday, when it described the feelings of “failure and bitterness”, which was left behind the spell that was shown there by the Argentine.
Miami trainer Javier Mascherano meanwhile believes that the unfortunate memory of his time in Paris is encouraging.
“It is clear that it is better for us if he plays angry because he is one of these players who, if he has something in his head, gives additional efforts,” Mascherano told ESPN.
With Luis Enrique and PSG, who have great ambitions to add a world championship title to their European crown, there would be even more bitterness if Messi – days after his 38th birthday – managed to switch off on Sunday.
As/bb
