Following a slender 1-0 win over Stade Brestois on Sunday night, Luis Enrique said that he believes that Paris Saint-Germain have already wrapped up their fifth consecutive Ligue 1 title. “There is a 99.9% chance that we are already champions,” said the Spaniard.
He is right to be confident. With two games remaining, the first of which is on Wednesday night, against RC Lens, PSG have a six-point lead at the top of Ligue 1. Their goal difference to Lens, their only challenger, is at +15 in favour of Les Parisiens. The match against Les Sang et Or at the Stade Bollaert was billed as a title decider, and who knows, it may have been if it wasn’t postponed in order to aid PSG’s preparation for their UEFA Champions League quarter-final double-header against Liverpool.
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It is a postponement that certainly worked in PSG’s favour. Not only is the match against Lens tonight now a dead rubber, but the club are also through to the final of the UCL, where they will face Arsenal. And their strong standing in the league means that attention has already turned towards this game.
On Monday night, the UNFP Awards ceremony took place in Paris. Luis Enrique was nominated for the Ligue 1 Manager of the Season award, yet he wasn’t present. He explained his absence on Tuesday. “I don’t go to this kind of party,” began the Spaniard. “I prefer to stay at home to study Arsenal.” He went on to congratulate Lens manager Pierre Sage, who won the managerial award.
PSG goalkeepers being prepared for Arsenal challenge?
Luis Enrique, broaching the topic of how he approaches the match against Lens, continued, “Both teams arrive in similar circumstances: with a final to play, in the Coupe de France for Lens, one week after the end of the league season, and for us in the UCL, two weeks after. The distribution of minutes will be different […] I think that Pierre Sage will do the same thing as me: look to make the most of the match, between the best two teams in French football.”
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There were also signs in training that PSG were already preparing for Arsenal’s set-piece ‘antics’. Images broadcast by RMC Sport showed Les Parisiens’ goalkeepers involved in a drill in which they were jostled and shoved, a mimicry of what will likely await them in Budapest at the end of the month.
GFFN | Luke Entwistle
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