PSG – Manchester City – 10:18 p.m., 0-2: How PSG’s season changed in a fraction of minutes

The storm is, it seems, the most unpredictable meteorological phenomenon. You had to be really cheeky to imagine Manchester City being blown away with such force by PSG when the English were leading 0-2 35 minutes from the end of the match. In a few minutes against the 2023 European champion, Paris scored 40% of the goals in its European season. Insane. Whereas, precisely, this PSG seemed to us to be at the bottom of the bucket and lost for the rest of the competition. How could his destiny change so quickly when the French champions have been stumbling over all kinds of posts, defenders and goalkeepers in the Champions League for months? Attempt to explain.

To understand what happened at this totally unreasonable end to the evening, we have to go back to the beginning of it when everything was still calm. Under downpours of rain, hundreds of supporters, soaked but not discouraged, waited for the Parisian bus to give it a welcome rarely seen even on very drunken evenings. Smoke bombs, shouting songs: the players quickly understood that this evening would not be like the others. “As soon as we arrived, we felt a different atmosphere“, testified Achraf Hakimi after the match. The Park made a hell of a noise for 90 minutes and even at 0-2, he continued to sing, push, scream.

“The supporters were phew…“, exclaimed Gianluigi Donnarumma. “There'sst the best atmosphere I have seen in 13 years, since I arrived at PSG“, even dared a radiant Nasser Al-Khelaifi in front of the media. If brushing his audience in the wrong direction is confusingly banal, it must be recognized that the enthusiasm of the Parc des Princes played a determining role this Wednesday. Paris would never have reversed the situation without the breath of 47,818 spectators. So much for the irrational, the intangible.

On the pitch, the return of Ousmane Dembélé changed everything by bringing dynamism and audacity to an attack which had been going in circles until now. His goal, that of reducing the Parisian score, was the turning point of the match and perhaps of PSG's season because it came just three minutes after City's second and completely reversed the dynamics of the evening. “This goal gave us a lot of strengthHakimi confirmed. OWe got back to the score very quickly and we understood that it was possible.“

To put it another way, neither the players nor the Park had time to doubt. “We were never afraid“, continued the Moroccan. And this is an essential parameter to explain why the tide turned so quickly. It must be said that the double blow of fate which befell PSG seemed like a great injustice as it dominated the debates The first period sowed the seeds of revolt, Luis Enrique and his men knew deep down, even at 0-2, that they were the strongest this Wednesday against the English champion But the 53. first minutes have looked like a perfect summary of Paris' European season so far: domination, frank, an inability to conclude and, at the end, a punishment.

Except that, this time, PSG fought against fate. “Dare even more, that's what I told them at half-time. Against City, we can't calculate, and in two actions we conceded two goals and it was a shock, but the team insisted, felt the support of the publicc”, said Luis Enrique. Even if, because this game remains a balance of power, we must not forget what this whirlwind of emotions reminded us: City remains ill. A team in full convalescence with a nothing would have been possible against the best version of Skyblues.

The last x-factor in the spectacular turnaround is called Bradley Barcola. He too is quite a symbol. While he has hovered over Ligue 1 since August, he was sinking in the Champions League as he nosedived for 53 minutes on Wednesday. But his spectacular tumble on Dembélé's goal changed the course of his career in the Champions League. In four minutes, he succeeded where he had failed for months in C1: to score, score and change the destiny of his people.

The nice guy overturned the table. Like this PSG that is too docile, too diligent and too serious since the start of the season. He was missing this moment of grace, this last half hour perhaps marks the birth of the new post-Mbappé Paris. “Ona a great team with personality, a young team but with character and the best coach in the world“, concluded its president, delighted. We will of course have to take at least one point in Stuttgart to keep a happy memory of this rainy evening. But we would swear that PSG collected much more than a victory against City. Perhaps be a reason to dream bigger.