Had another look at the French press late last night. One article quoted our loveable scouser, Carragher, whose opinion is that Pochettino should be packing his bags for OT because PSG's front three don't track back and the owners won't let him leave any of the three out. Clearly the view of OT is a bit foggy from Merseyside!
The other was much more thoughtful. It stressed again that PSG's front three were made a liability on Wednesday because City maintained a very high line throughout and this meant that their failure to take any defensive responsibility gave City a numerical superiority in midfield and then up front which the work rate and quality of City's players used to devastating effect. An interesting statistic quoted was that Idrissa Gueye was on the field for an hour in a key area of the pitch, but only had as many touches as Kaylor Navas, the goalkeeper! Herrera actually had two fewer touches! As it says "(They were) too busy running trying to deal with City's attacks (so they) could never get in position to help Paredes bring the ball out of defence" and so it was constantly coming back at them. They don't seem too bothered at the prospect of Poch's departure, perhaps because they think Zidane will come in, but more because Poch seems incapable of dealing with the problem - on Wednesday when PSG were crying out for a change he left the front three on and brought di Maria on for Gueye. City simply continued to drag PSG's midfield and back line all over the place and keep possession for even longer. The belief seems to be that Pep simply knew exactly how to deal with PSG and has players talented and hard-working enough to put his plans into effect to the letter. City seem to be appreciated more by French pundits than British!
