French football expert Jonathan Johnson has slammed Paris Saint-Germain manager Luis Enrique for some of his baffling decisions in yesterday’s Champions League defeat at home to Barcelona.
PSG have it all to do in the second leg of this tie, with two goals from Raphinha and a late header from Andreas Christensen giving Barcelona a 3-2 win at the Parc des Princes, though Johnson feels Enrique made a lot of poor choices that cost his team the game.
Speaking exclusively to CaughtOffside for his latest Daily Briefing column, Johnson explained that he felt the Spanish tactician made an error by leaving Warren Zaire-Emery on the bench, while he also made questionable experimental choices such as using Marco Asensio as a false nine, and shifting Ousmane Dembele out into a wider role than he’s played for much of this season.
This in turn impacted Kylian Mbappe’s performance, meaning the France international couldn’t have the kind of impact we usually see from him, so it’s clear Enrique has to re-think his strategy ahead of the second leg at the Nou Camp.
Enrique has questions to answer after PSG defeat, says Johnson
“The one facing the most questions ahead of next week’s second leg will be Luis Enrique,” Johnson said.
“Playing Lucas Hernandez on the right-hand side of central defence really didn’t work out at all, but to be fair to him that’s partly because Lucas Beraldo was in real difficulty for much of the match. Still, for Hernandez to then also be playing in a position he’s not really familiar with or been used in that often didn’t help PSG.
“Enrique then made some in-game decisions to try and change these strange choices he made in his starting XI, with Marquinhos playing central in the second half, while Hernandez got moved to right-back, which is a bit baffling as he normally plays left-back. This completely destabilised the defence, so it’s not too surprising that the stand-out performer in PSG’s defence was Nuno Mendes, who made a very good block on the line from a Robert Lewandowski header.
“The biggest surprise, however, was going without Warren Zaire-Emery from the start – obviously Enrique did bring him on in the second half, but it looks like a mistake not to start him. Ousmane Dembele also played out wide despite being used to quite good effect through the middle this season, while one of the most bizarre decisions of all was probably using Marco Asensio as a sort of wild card false-nine. He was then hooked at half time because it was not the most convincing performance from him, and I think all of that contributed towards Kylian Mbappe not really being able to get into the game, and it was one of the weakest performances of his season so far.
“There were some bright spots, with Vitinha scoring and looking very good, but the result leaves PSG with a lot to do as they head to the Nou Camp for the second leg. Overall PSG probably aren’t out of this tie yet, and credit to Barcelona for a very good performance, but there are certainly questions there that need answering by Luis Enrique.”