Champions League Night in Paris: Perfect Barcelona Test Two-Time Defending Champions PSG

Lamine Yamal celebrates a goal for Barcelona. The 19-year-old is the player Paris Saint-Germain have spent the week planning for. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

There are league-phase games, and then there is this. Paris Saint-Germain, winners of the last two Champions Leagues and chasing a third straight title according to TNT Sports, against a Barcelona side that has won every single match it has played this season — 11 wins from 11 across all competitions, a run Radio Times and Barca News Network both put at the top of European form. Something unbeaten gives at the Parc des Princes on Tuesday night, and it gives in front of one of the loudest crowds in Europe.

The two clubs are level on six points at the top of the league-phase table, with PSG ahead on goals scored, Radio Times reported. Level on points, level on aura, and — if their recent meetings are anything to go by — incapable of playing a dull game against each other.

How they got here

PSG have made the louder statement so far. After a 6-1 opening-game demolition of Slovan Bratislava, Luis Enrique's side went to Manchester City last week and won 4-2, racing into a 3-0 lead before half-time, according to TNT Sports. They followed it with a 3-1 comeback victory at Strasbourg on Saturday, and USA Today noted they have now won their last four league games to sit second in Ligue 1, behind leaders Lyon on goal difference.

Barcelona's path has been quieter only in volume of headlines, not results. Hansi Flick's team dispatched Feyenoord 5-1 and Galatasaray 4-1 in their opening two Champions League games, TNT Sports reported, and warmed up for Paris with a win over Real Betis at the weekend that kept their perfect La Liga record intact. As tests go, though, this is the first one that can actually fail them: PSG away is the fixture every other contender will be measuring themselves against.

The Yamal problem, without the usual answer

Every PSG-Barcelona preview this week starts in the same place: Lamine Yamal against the left side of PSG's defence. The problem for the hosts is that their usual answer is in the treatment room. Nuno Mendes, whose duels with Yamal have been a feature of recent meetings between the clubs, injured his left thigh in the second half against Strasbourg, was substituted in the 53rd minute, and is expected to be sidelined for a few weeks, according to USA Today. Lucas Digne is expected to start at left back in his place — and to spend his evening in Yamal's neighbourhood.

Luis Enrique was not pretending otherwise on Monday. "The best way to stop Lamine Yamal is to keep the ball away from Barcelona," the PSG coach said, in quotes reported by USA Today. "If he cannot get the ball, everything is calm." It is a lovely line and an honest one: PSG's plan is not a plan for Yamal at all, it is a plan for the ball. Whether a team built to attack can spend 90 minutes keeping it away from Barcelona — a side that presses as aggressively as any in Europe — is the tactical question of the night.

There is better news elsewhere in the PSG team. Captain Marquinhos, who missed the trip to Strasbourg to manage his workload, should return in central defence, USA Today reported, while Maghnes Akliouche and Senny Mayulu are doubts after training on Monday. Barcelona's list is longer: Andreas Christensen, Roony Bardghji, Jules Kounde and Eric Garcia are out and Gerard Martin is a doubt, according to Barca Blaugranes. The visitors do get their captain back — Raphinha returned briefly against Real Betis and is likely to start, Barca News Network reported. English referee Michael Oliver takes charge of the game.

The Parc des Princes, Paris — home of Paris Saint-Germain and the stage for Tuesday's Champions League headline game. Photo: Wikimedia Commons

One more wrinkle: Barcelona cannot afford to empty the tank entirely. Sunday brings the season's first Clasico against Real Madrid, and TNT Sports noted Flick's side may have half an eye on it even in Paris. PSG, by contrast, have built their whole early season around nights like this one. Expect the champions to treat a league-phase game in October like it is a semi-final — because for a team chasing three in a row, the statement is the point.

The rest of Matchday 3

Paris is the main event, not the whole show. The full Tuesday slate, published by PSG's official site, opens with Fenerbahce against Slavia Prague and Sabah against Borussia Dortmund in the early window. The later games send Villarreal to Anfield to face Liverpool and AEK Athens to the Etihad against Manchester City, alongside Roma against Slovan Bratislava, Porto against PSV, Napoli against Bodo/Glimt and Stuttgart against Atletico Madrid.

Wednesday is hardly a comedown: Bayern Munich host Arsenal in the week's other heavyweight tie, Real Madrid welcome RB Leipzig, and there are also home games for Inter, Sporting CP and Aston Villa, per the same fixture list. By Thursday morning, the league-phase table will have a shape — and somebody's perfect record will be gone.

Premier League: the table after Matchweek 7

Domestically, the weekend closed on Monday night in north London, where James Maddison scored on his first start in 536 days to set Tottenham on their way to a 3-1 win over Coventry — a first victory of the season that lifted Spurs off the bottom and up to 16th. The full Matchweek 7 picture, set out in The Mag's table roundup: Manchester City are perfect, seven wins from seven and 21 points; Arsenal are second on 18 despite, in The Mag's phrase, "scraping through game after game"; and Brighton are the season's early entertainers in third on 16 points, with a league-high 23 goals — five of them in Sunday's 5-0 derby rout of Crystal Palace. At the other end, Sunderland now prop up the table. Seven rounds in, the gap between a title race and a relegation fight is about four good weeks, which is exactly what makes this league impossible to leave alone.

MLS: Messi and the record in front of him

Stateside, the storyline with a number attached belongs to Lionel Messi. The Associated Press, via Sportsnet, reported that Messi's two goals in Inter Miami's 3-1 win at Atlanta on Saturday took him to a league-leading 25 for the season, and that his 15 assists — tied for the league lead with LAFC's Son Heung-min — made him the first player in MLS history with at least 15 assists in three consecutive seasons. Add it up and Messi has 40 goal contributions, nine short of the single-season record of 49 Carlos Vela set with LAFC in 2019, with four matches left to chase it, according to the AP report. Miami, already qualified for the playoffs, travel to the New York Red Bulls on Saturday. Nashville, meanwhile, were held 1-1 by San Jose at the weekend and failed to wrap up the Supporters' Shield, GOAL's roundup reported — so the East's top seed, like Vela's record, stays alive for another week.

It is, all told, a very good Tuesday to be a soccer fan: a European heavyweight fight in Paris at noon Pacific, a league phase that starts sorting itself out by Thursday, and a 39-year-old in Miami quietly hunting a record that was supposed to be untouchable. Previously will have the PSG-Barcelona result and reaction once the final whistle goes in Paris.