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In football
Kingsley Coman’s second-half purpose gave the German champions a 1-0 win over Paris Saint-Germain and their sixth name in Europe’s biggest club competition.
By Rory Smith
At this moment of jubilation, the cameras pursued despair. He was discovered in the gentle and desperate manner of Neymar, sitting on the bench of Paris Saint-Germain, the best picture of pain. Neymar, tears in the eyes. Neymar, far away. Neymar, head in your hands.
Here, in a strict approach, the plan, the story. No player fits as perfectly as an avatar of his team as Neymar. He is the most beloved player in the world and his club is the richest assignment football has ever seen. His career has been formed through money and the club’s ambitions are fueled through it. It is the star involved only through its own light. He’s the prince who aspired to be king. He’s the CEO. made meat.
His quest is the quest for his club: to win hearts and minds, show his greatness and courage and, in doing so, to gain popularity and acceptance. Both see the Champions League as the only step in which it can be achieved. Both had failed at the peak on Sunday: only one purpose had been enough to give Bayern Munich a 1-0 win and a sixth European crown, and prolong the P.S.G.’s agony.
In those persistent camera shots, silently, Neymar not only illustrated how he felt, but also exposed the limitations that had led him and his team here. It’s less difficult to tell an individual story than a collective story. There is no single image – neither Joshua Kimmich’s central back, nor Kingsley Coman’s exact header, nor the rise of Manuel Neuer’s trophy – that sums up the source of Bayern’s success.
There’s also no concise explanation of bachelors either. Bayern was, through a nuance, the most productive team in the last that produced a dish other than one of its ingredients. Two attack skill groups combined in Lisbon to create a game, a captivating and captivating game, which was more of a slow drama than fast entertainment.
Both defended with courage and metal and thought. Neither of us was as sure as usual. Robert Lewandowski was under his ruthless record at the most sensible of the Bayern line; Kylian Mbappé wasn’t as explosive as it can be for P.S.G. Neymar didn’t need pictorial ethics, but his invention was a little short.
Both groups were looking for a national and European treble (league silver, the Cup and the Champions League) and yet neither did he. Bayern won because he approached the CEO, because his self-perception is more defined, because they draw his strength and wonder of his formula and not the prodigious skill of his individuals.
Bayern coach Hansi Flick had the courage to replace tactics out of respect, or concern, with the P.S.G.’s worrying frontline. Bayern played the first defensive line which, according to an unusual consensus, Mbappé in particular would appreciate. He trusted his players to blink. Margins were smart and P.S.G. He barely played poorly, but the praise justified the risk.
It may not be convenient for Neymar and his teammates, of course. The identity of the player who proved his loss will also add up to P.S.G. Coman was born and raised in Paris; joined the P.S.G. Youth Academy. He was a teammate of Presnel Kimpembe, the central defender of the French champion, until the age of 18.
Coman made his first appearance at the P.S.G. team at 16, the youngest player to do so. Like so many others, it is a product of Paris and its suburbs, suburbs and satellite cities that are the maximum fertile ground for breeding footballers in the world. Only Sao Paulo, Buenos Aires and south London are even close to competing.
And yet Coman, like Paul Pogba and Ngolo Kanté and even Mbappé, until he brought the house at enormous cost, escaped. Coman left for Juventus in 2014, frustrated by the lack of opportunities presented through his city team. The scale of investments of Qatari supporters of P.S.G. then he had made the club a fallow flat for young aspiring men. Coman went to Italy and from there to Munich. Now he’s back to hang out with the club that did it, to defeat him while he’s got his goal.
But a symbol doesn’t tell a story. Coman’s career has been remarkable. He is 24 years old and yet has already won 20 primary trophies. Every season he has been professional – he debuted in 2013 – he has finished as a league champion: twice with P.S.G., once with Juventus, five times with Bayern.
Coman is, in other words, the ultimate player of the European superclub era. It embodies the stratification of the game, because the global elite is different from that of mere mortals who may not win a championship in each and every season of their career. In such circumstances, it is almost inevitable that at some point it will mark the purpose of victory in the Champions League final. It’s proof that at a certain height, he’s about to fall.
Despite all of Neymar’s tears, he and the team he represents, in more tactics than one, are precisely the same. Sunday’s final disguised as a union between two visions of football: the old force and the new money, the status quo and the insurgency, the immutable object of the self-proclaimed aristocracy of European football and the unstoppable force of a co-opted sports team. as a marketing tool for a nation-state.
In Bayern Munich’s victory, it is conceivable to draw the conclusion that, for now, at least, there is some kind of winner. Paris Saint-Germain has been obsessed with the Champions League for a decade. He spent billions chasing him. He made his way through the corridors of force and broke the rules, either in letter and spirit, and did his best to move the landscape for his own purposes. You need nothing more than this exclusive trophy, this latest confirmation of your plan.
And although it has come closer than ever this summer, it has failed again. It draws attention to a victory that is not necessarily for the greats: Bayern Munich, despite all their folkloric customs, is not what any foreigner would call adorable, but for how things have been. The old certainties are maintained. The new order has not been established and Neymar sits on the bench crying.
But a bachelor symbol doesn’t tell a full story. P.S.G. it hasn’t failed, not really, not in the long run. Your presence here was a success. A decade after the arrival of his money from the Gulf, he can breathe the same rarefied air as the old elite. This, in the context of what Qatar expects from its investment, is almost equivalent to the Champions League trophy. Almost.
Also, all the associations that accompany it. To have Neymar, the most beloved player on the planet, an icon, a social media phenomenon, as an avatar of this P.S.G. The team will have to demonstrate everything that is valuable to the club’s supporters about this project. He speaks of strength and wealth, glamour, relevance and affection, in some circles, if not universally.
Neymar’s depression may have been the last symbol of the night, but it’s the last of a bankruptcy and not the book’s spotlight. Just as the European football season lasts nine months and, in the end, Coman gets a medal or three, the same goes for P.S.G. There will be possibility, and possibility after that, and so on in the future.
Young money temporarily became an old power and insurgents in the ruling class. Neymar will be back here; P.S.G. I’ll come back here. That’s how the game is built. That’s how the game works. At a certain height, tears never last long.
Andrew Das and Rory Smith of The Times followed the Champions League final as they progressed. Read on to be more informed
FULL-TIME
The whistle sounded and the absent crowd roared, but Bayern Munich did so: they beat Paris Saint-Germain, 1-0, to win their sixth Champions League title, and first since 2013.
The German champions triumphed thanks to a header in the second part of Kingsley Coman, a Paris local and former P.S.G. young player. It was Bayern’s 21st consecutive victory in an unprecedented season: interrupted by a pandemic and then postponed and ultimately crowned in August, through a late-door Champions League.
Defeat will be especially painful for P.S.G. and its Qatari owners, who have spent a decade, and millions of dollars, building a team limit to deliver the Champions League, The largest prize in European football. But while his all-star team, led by Brazilian striker Neymar and France World Cup winner Kylian Mbappé, created damaging opportunities against Bayern, has never managed to break through.
While the club has abandoned its underperforming label this season by reaching the final, its quest for its first championship will continue.
90 ‘2
Lewandowski goes to an end in what seemed like a real-time shame. But P.S.G. does not wait to measure his clever fortune: his strike force is divided into 4 men. Mbappé gets a ball for Neymar on the left side of the area. Roll and shoot, but the ball slides through two definers, a goalkeeper and Choupo-Moting … and wide-licking wheel.
Bayern got lucky there. Not Neymar. But what a moment it could have been in overtime.
90 ‘
A moment of danger was not a moment: Mbappé was well offside when shooting diversity in Neuer. Neuer still recorded it, because that’s what Neuer does.
P.S.G. it’s finished now.
81 ‘
It was his fault: he gave up the ball and tried to give it back to Lewandowski. Eric Maxim Choupo-Moting, the hero of the quarter-final victory, will replace Di Maria as Neymar’s new attacking partner. But what Parisians want is a goal, and Bayern have so much experience that they’re going to have something special now.
As the game resumes, Thiago Silva receives a yellow one for shooting Lewandowski, who has done so. Never. stops. Come.
70 ‘
Rory’s view after the goal:
Bayern suddenly looked like the team that swept Barcelona, which the team that discovered Lyon more complicated than expected.
Coman – a P.S.G. Youth product: put the German team at the forefront and within 20 minutes of a national and European treble. Twice Bayern threatened to boost their lead in minutes. There was uncertainty at Bayern sometimes tonight, as evidenced by how inhibited Alphonso Davies was, but the purpose forbade him. P.S.G. you’ll have to weather the typhoon looking for an answer. How you balance those two impulses will be key.
68 ‘
Coman’s paintings gave way to Perisic in a double replacement for Bayern. Philippe Coutinho arrives by Gnabry at the same time, making it a new set of extremes for Bayern who are looking to see that.
Coman’s goal, if he stands, will win him the biggest prize of his career. But first prize.
At the other end, there is a look of deep concentration – or depression – on the faces of Neymar and Mbappé.
sixty-five ‘
Replaces Paredes in one last roll of dice. Minutes later, Julian Draxler enters for Herrera.
59 ‘
This is their first game, and as if Bayern were at the forefront. Joshua Kimmich plays as a supplier, launching a simple center at the time of the pole, where Coman finds him with an instant headbutt that arrives right in front of Navas’ purpose and heads to the right post. Bayern 1, P.S.G. 0, and Flick seems like a genius at freeing a Parisian opposed to P.S.G. and hoping that emotion will produce something special.
A minute later, Coman, left, doubled the lead with an appetizing pass to Lewandowski in the middle. But Presnel Kimpembe dives to explain things.
56 ‘
The center hits Di Maria as he challenges a header in midfield in one of the fouls you see in each and every match. Neymar thinks they deserve criminal fees and maybe an arrest, but our referee makes the decision not to qualify and retracts with a yellow one.
However, these go up a little, and in a game with such fine margins, you wonder if at some point a fatigued foul can be costly if the player is already dressed in yellow.
50 ‘
Gnabry and Goretzka took a sandwich from Neymar (accidentally, apparently) and returned to the center of the field a minute later (this one seemed a little more energetic). Teams regroup in this performative way that they do, but this error was a little biter.
Replays obviously show that Neymar tried things a little bit: Andrew Keh of The Times once called interim coaches to assess Neymar’s immersion and his story, but the final minutes showed a little more head start. Gnabry gets a yellow one for the foul and Paredes gets one for his reaction.
Middle
Rory Smith’s half-time review:
The most productive indicator of the quality of a game, in my opinion, is the speed with which it turns out to pass, and that first part did not seem to last only forty-five minutes. True, it has no purpose; It is true that there have only been a handful of genuine opportunities, but the quality is so high, and the threat inherent in the determination of any of the groups to play “by third parties”, as the footballers insist, so impressive, that it has moved. to a total zipper.
However, this gives more and more the impression of a game that can be simply by a mistake: an extra pass, a strong touch in the wrong place. Both groups flirt with danger. Eventually, one of them will be caught.
45 ‘
Coman turned Kehrer around in what turned out to be the ultimate half-time attack. And he also hit him, turning to purpose and then falling into feeling a touch from behind. The Italian referee looked at the long, perhaps waiting for the video assistant referee to give him some advice. But while Muller yells in his face, he makes the decision not to point his finger at the place.
Instead, whistle and the groups leave, aimlessly.
43 ‘
After exchanging blows, though not genuine, in the first 40 minutes, both groups seem happy to be a little more cautious while practicing part-time. Bayern keep pushing, then harass anyone who tries to move the ball from behind on the ground. P.S.G., meanwhile, turns out to be looking to hit as fast as possible. Both groups played well; they just didn’t score. Still.
And just then they almost do it: a lousy lap of Alaba in his own penalty dominance hands the ball – after a quick exchange with Herrera – to an open Mbappé (!!!!) at the point. But he hit his shot cleanly or precisely, and Neuer strangled him.
Rory looks back at a player you might have missed:
Of course, there are players who will draw much more attention tonight than Leandro Paredes, but a little word about the Argentine. It’s what a past generation of British enthusiasts called “intriguing,” and there are times when he is a glorious representative of the role, as shown through this brilliant first pass from Mbappé a few minutes ago. He had a traveling career, emerging in Boca Juniors, impressive in costumes and outings in Rome, and P.S.G. bought it, basically as an emergency canopy for Marco Verratti, in Zenit St. Petersburg. He’s only 26, but watching him play and play well at this level makes you a little unhappy that he spent 18 months in Russia so early in his career.
31 ‘
A centre from the right discovers its path to Lewandowski’s heavily protected front steps in front of Navas, however, Costa Rica is a fair reaction goalkeeper and nicely defies him and then regains the rebound.
Bayern leaned forward again: pressing, pricking, sniffing a goal. P.S.G. you’ll have to be careful in the last 15 minutes or so. Davies also picked up the first yellow card from the attack a few minutes ago.
25 ‘
Di Maria shoots from above from a close diversity, the third big chance in a few minutes, however, the game’s remarkable top is that Bayern’s central defender, Jerome Boateng, injures his leg (it looks like he’s grimacing while holding his inner ttop).
Anyway, he’s done with his day. Niklas is about to update him, as well as on the semi-final break.
21 ‘
A smart spin at the penalty point gives the target Bayern player a smart look. He turns around and hits Navas, but he has hit the ball purely, and falls off the left post and stays away. So now both groups have had a smart overview. Maybe I’ll open things up even more.
18 ‘
A strong Ball from Mbappé cuts bayern’s back and sends Neymar beyond Alaba. Throw a left-handed shot at Neuer, who has a chance to catch him with his back arm and then block the rebound to corner. This is the first genuine and threatening possibility of the party, and shows what P.S.G. can do in an instant.
12 ‘
There’s no sign that Bayern are converting their technique to recognize the P.S.G. Rhythm. he brags beforehand: Alaba and Boateng have camped in the middle line and don’t show much interest in going back. It is out of necessity, more than anything: if it backs down, Bayern play the intense and urgent game that makes it so dangerous.
Like P.S.G. dealing with this tension may be the decisive influence of the party. It is tempting to assume that Bayern have much more delight in these kinds of scenarios and, this is true at the institutional level, we can guess if it counts for anything.
It’s much more relevant and things are more balanced. There are 4 survivors of the 2013 victory in Bayern’s starting line-up (Boateng, Alaba, Manuel Neuer and Thomas Muller), but P.S.G. It features 3 former Champions League champions to Neymar, Angel Di Maria and the restored Keylor Navas. Oh, and Kylian Mbappé won a World Cup. Does it help you?
11 ‘
Now it’s the French champion who puts the tension in Bayern’s gang, and Mbappé gets a kick to the left. It’s a smart position, but a bigger signal. Mbappé saw two shots blocked one after the other. But I had them; this is the ultimate if you’re Tuchel.
2 ‘
Bayern, unsurprisingly, pressed from the first minute and temporarily forced a damaging journey while P.S.G. try to play in the back. Bayern wasted it, but he temporarily won a kick-off when P.S.G. take a look again.
It’s a way to divert attention from its own top line.
Bayern Munich’s Hansi Flick made a replacement for the semi-finals, with French winger Kingsley Coman replacing Ivan Perisic with the left. Perisic had played very well, but also played a lot, so it can be a search for cooler legs. Flick said he liked Coman’s “quality” and his ability to use his speed with P.S.G. defenders, but admitted that there was also a feeling at stake with this movement.
“We are Paris, your years of training club,” Flick said in an interview before the game. “We hope he’s a little more motivated.”
Bayern XI: Manuel Neuer; Alphonso Davies, David Alaba, Jerome Boateng, Joshua Kimmich; Thiago Alcantara, Leon Goretzka; Kingsley Coman, Thomas Muller, Serge Gnabry; Robert Lewandowski.
The biggest replacement for P.S.G. It is in goal, where the experienced Keylor Navas returns from a leg injury. But manager Thomas Tuchel also said Saturday that Marco Verratti (who starts at the bank) is back in good health. You can’t spend 90 or 120 minutes, but it’s a valuable reserve if your team wants to. He had missed the quarter-finals, but made a past submarine appearance against RB Leipzig in the semi-finals.
P.S.G. XI: Keylor Navas, Thilo Kehrer, Thiago Silva, Presnel Kimpembe, Juan Bernat, Marquinhos, Ander Herrera, Leandro Paredes, Angel Di Maria, Neymar, Kylian Mbappé.
Italian Daniele Orsato will lead today’s meeting.
There’s no bad Champions League final. This is the focus of the European season, after all, the most important club game of the year (and the biggest annual sporting occasion on the planet, in addition to the Super Bowl). When there is so much at stake, drama and tension are inherent.
But that doesn’t mean all Champions League finals are good. Some are defeated for their own importance, and the game itself is austere, cautious and inhibited: think of 2003, when AC Milan and Juventus produced 120 minutes of football so badly that any of the groups has been disqualified, or even last year’s effort between Liverpool and Juventus. Tottenham.
Many like exhibitions, where one team is so amazing to the other that the result begins to feel predetermined: Barcelona, for example, in 2009, 2011 and 2015, or Real Madrid in 2017 and 2018.
The real classics are the exception: in recent years, perhaps only Liverpool’s ordinary victory in 2005, Chelsea’s remarkable resistance in 2012 and Bayern’s last win in 2013 can justify this description.
Despite the strangeness of an empty stadium and the fact that we’re in August, there’s an explanation for why that 2020 can simply win a spot in the canyon. Bayern and P.S.G. star: Robert Lewandowski and Alphonso Davies, Neymar and Kylian Mbappé. And the two groups have many other similarities: either they are national champions who play on the front foot, and are either as satisfied with the property as they are damaging in the back. Moreover, both have very little joy of recent defeats, boast formidable attacks and, in fact, in the case of Bayern, have slightly questionable defences. P.S.G. it was built to win this tournament; Bayern are on the cusp of a national and European treble.
Bayern’s imperious form, especially the dismantling of Barcelona, was enough for Maximum to assume that the German team is the favorite, but P.S.G. You will have noticed the times created by Lyon in the semi-finals (and even by Barcelona before its collapse) and will have taken on value. Neither team is perfect. Both groups have many strengths. This is exactly how a Champions League final takes place. There’s never the bad guys. This transparent this bar with ease.
The only numbers that matter are the ones on the scoreboard, of course, but here are a few more to stay in the brain today.
425: That’s the number of days since the first game of the Champions League this season. The five-month delay on the pandemic made her the longest in the competition.
-1: This is the number of days before the opening of the new European season. (France first on Saturday). England, Spain, Germany and Italy will begin their new season in September.
15: Goals scored through Bayern’s Robert Lewandowski in the Champions League this season. He wants two more to match Cristiano Ronaldo’s record in a bachelor campaign.
5: General Bayern Champions League titles. Only Real Madrid (13), A.C. Milan (7) and Liverpool (6) have more.
1: Champions League titles won through French clubs. Monaco, in 2004, the last French team to qualify for the final. Marseille, in 1993, the only French club to win it.
Sunday’s attack is a kind of flashback: the first assembly in the top since 1998 of groups that have registered for the tournament as national champions.
It is, of course, as in the days of the old European Cup, when you had to win the house championship just to enter the competition. The creation of the Champions League in 1992 replaced all that, opening the door to more groups (mainly primary leagues) and more revenue, but also paving the way for Italians, Germans, Spaniards and all. English finals.
Tradition is a hard force: P.S.G. has won seven consecutive French titles and Bayern Munich 8 in a row in Germany, but you take your nostalgia where you can.
Bayern Munich came out of the organisation level as a mere winner against Tottenham, Olympiakos and the red star of Belgrade. In the knockouts, he undesired Chelsea (7-1 in total), Barcelona (8-2 – ae!) And Lyon (3-0). Bayern have a 10-0 record at this year’s festival and have scored at least 3 goals in nine of those matches. With 4.2 objectives in line with the game, in fact, it is the most outstanding team in the history of the Champions League.
P.S.G. He also left the organizing stage, generating five victories and a draw in an organization that included Real Madrid, Club Brujas and Galatasaray. He overcame a shortfall in the first leg to defeat Dortmund in the 16th circular, and then recovered – with two goals in the 90th minute – to beat Atalanta 2-1 in the Lisbon quarter-finals. RB Leipzig was a lot (3-0) in Tuesday’s semi-final.
Unlike Bayern, who can box a handful of players when they won the festival in 2013, P.S.G. has never played in the Champions League final before this season.
The strange thing is that the two finalists were the two groups that some would have the greatest difficulties in Lisbon.
Because the French league closed amid the pandemic and never resumed its season, Paris Saint-Germain arrived after having played two competitive matches since March. Bayern Munich had a one-month break between the German Cup final and their resumption of the Champions League, a dismissal that, according to Oliver Kahn, the club’s new executive leader, can be just a disadvantage.
It turns out that neither rust nor rest is a problem.
In P.S.G: Sunday’s game is the climax of the season for both teams, but for some others, especially at the P.S.G. – adjustment is the culmination of years of expenses, planning, preparation and positioning. Qatar, of course, has built this total club for this exclusive moment, with a cash investment and national pride probably incalculable. Kylian Mbappé, who is still 21, can earn the name of the world’s largest club in his hometown two years after bringing the name of the World Cup back to France. Thomas Tuchel can achieve what many other famous coaches have not been able to achieve and make P.S.G.’s wealth. talents the most productive club in Europe. And then there’s Neymar. Let’s leave to Rory Smith what this game and this season can mean to him, his symbol and his legacy.
At Bayern Munich: Hansi Flick intended to be a transitional solution as Bayern’s guyager when he moved last autumn, a hand of confidence to gently advise an aging and failed team away from the precipice of the decline. Instead, he’s become the best guy for the job. But he didn’t defeat bayern with tactical magic or a crazy formula or a revolutionary approach, Rory discovered in dozens of interviews with those who know him best. Turns out he’s not an idiot.
On life in Lisbon this month: the restart of the Champions League in Portugal over the past two weeks has been a Herculean affair for UEFA, organizer of the event. It has months to expand its plan and a host city is in position for more than a year. This year has been, um, another in the maximum of each and every aspect. Earlier this month, Rory and Tariq Panja reviewed the regulations and discovered that there was a plan and policy in place for each and every one: who stayed where, how much water and sports drinks would be provided, the parts of the fields where groups can simply warm up. and (perhaps most importantly) where it may not. Two weeks later, the book’s maximum draconian lines, which evolved to treat how to expel an aspect affected by coronavirus, remain, fortunately, unused.
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