H: $38
L: $33
H: $38
L: $32
H: $37
L: $31
H: $37
L: $31
H: $37
L: $32
H: $37
L: $31
The monetary inadequacy of the quarter-finals sees the French treble winners who spend a lot to face an obsolete Italian team
At the makeshift top European Cup, everyone has to be flexible.
The eighth round of the Champions League, transferred to Lisbon by the urgency of the coronavirus and condensed into the quarters and semi-finals with a stretch, were going to take the clubs out of their area of convenience.
Paris Saint-Germain, which is preparing in the Algarve for Wednesday’s quarter-finals against Atalanta, is said to have been happier in its own outdoor high-security educational floor in the French capital.
Manchester City’s Open Champions League lead rating
Neymar and Kylian Mbappé lead frantic celebrations as PSG wins French hat-trick after penalty drama
The cape-and-sword Atalanta seeks to give the town ruined by the coronavirus ‘something to smile about’ in Serie A
They were interrupted educational sessions in southern Portugal, as passing tourists and prospective spies can glimpse what they were doing.
At one point, the PSG even ordered the bus’s driving force to move its vehicle a few yards away to block the view of the tactical work of manager Thomas Tuchel.
This is how the PSG was discovered literally “parking the bus,” to use the word that usually describes groups that stack the ball to men when they fear the offensive force of the opposition.
Any team that tackles Atalanta’s fairy tale would be tempted to park the bus. The Italians have just finished the Serie A season with an astonishing 98 league goals, ahead of the others.
To triumph in the eighth round of his first Champions League campaign, Atalanta beat Valencia 8 times in February and March.
But despite all its airy and fluid football, it is difficult to make Atalanta the favorite at estadio da Luz. As Atalanta coach Gianpiero Gasperini told L’Equipe yesterday, “the PSG is a team built for the Champions League.”
And at what price. Three years ago, Neymar set the payment for the move it once paid when the PSG raised 222 million euros (904 million dirhams) to provoke the rescision clause of Barcelona.
Or, to put it in the context of this monetary inadequacy, Neymar charges 11 times more than Atalanta paid Sevilla last summer to make Colombian striker Luis Muriel the top signing in its history.
Now compare the current prices of Atalanta Cinderellas and PSG Princes.
Muriel, his teammates Duvan Zapata and Papu Gomez could, with bonuses, earn 1.8 million euros in a successful campaign. They are the most sensitive on the Atalanta pay scale. Neymar, without variables, receives an annual salary of 36 million euros.
And yet, in the sealed bubble that is UEFA’s rescue package for the interrupted Champions League, Atalanta are the absolute outliers.
A festival that has evolved as the exclusive domain of the clubs of big cities and where the name rarely ends in a new place, seems, in a refreshing and open way.
In the last 16 matches, Liverpool, Juventus and Real Madrid have been eliminated; Bayern Munich, the favourites and the PSG are the national champions still involved.
_________________________________________________
_________________________________________________
Instead of the league champions, Lisbon inherited a number of goals: the 98 in Atalanta in their 3rd position in Serie A; Manchester City’s 102 on their way to the position at the moment in the Premier League; The 108 Barcelona competitions in one season have been considered a failure so far because, Barca has beaten everyone in La Liga, they finished the moment.
Unless Bayern or Barcelona, who are measured on Friday, take the trophy, there will be a new call in the old cup in 2020.
There is a possibility that it will even pass to an ancient city of provinces, such as Leipzig, or Bergamo, house of Atalanta, with a population of 120,000 inhabitants.
Bergamo would appreciate it. The city had a terrible year, the epicentre of the Covid-19 epidemic in Italy, its hospitals and cemeteries were beaten in the spring.
“It was devastating,” Gasperini said. “As a club in Atalanta, we have to give to other people who cried so much something to smile about.”
The pandemic still defines the cases of this Champions League, with its empty stands, its brutal transfer to Lisbon. This puts the occasion in the place.
Atletico Madrid, who plays on Thursday against RB Leipzig, has left two players in Spain, Angel Correa and Sime Vrsaljko, who have tested positive for the virus, are asymptomatic and, according to Monday’s checkup, have failed to infect their teammates.
PSG and Atalanta fitness considerations are daily. Atalanta will have to do without the starting goalkeeper Pierluigi Gollini, who has a knee problem.
The French champion’s most sensible goalscorer, Kylian Mbappé, recovering from a sprained ankle, may only have enough compatibility for the bench while Angel Di Maria is sanctioned and Marco Verrati ruled by injury.
They are vital absences, but in a PSG that has spent more than a billion euros in less than a decade to aim for a first Champions League trophy, there is enough coverage.