In fact, since Paris Saint-Germain's defeat to Real Madrid in the Champions League group stage, Blank's life has been getting harder and harder.

This means they can only finish second in their group and face the stronger group winners in the knockout rounds.

And when they were unlucky to draw Chelsea, the worst team to mess with in the group, the pressure on Blanc increased.

Because the president of the club, Al-Nassr, no longer cares who you play, he only has one hard indicator, that is, the team must make a breakthrough in the Champions League, at least to enter the last four!

As for the results in the league, it is only a bonus now, even if you can remain unbeaten, even if you can win the championship eight rounds in advance!

This is mainly because since Qatar Group took over Paris Saint-Germain, they have lost in the quarterfinals of the Champions League almost every time, and have always been blocked from the Champions League semi-finals.

Therefore, Nasser is determined to create the best Champions League record in the team's history this time, otherwise, the coach will be dismissed!

The question is, is it that easy?

To reach the semi-finals, you must first enter the quarter-finals.

And to reach the quarter-finals, you have to get past Chelsea......

But Blank also knows that the upcoming two Champions League round of 16 knockout matches are really about to determine his fate at Paris Saint-Germain.

Last season, he led Paris Saint-Germain to win four French championships, the French Cup, the French League Cup, and the French Super Cup, monopolizing all the domestic championships;

However, due to the double elimination by Chelsea in the Champions League round of 16, Nassr did not give him a good look.

This season, Blank will also be hoping to complete the domestic quadruple for the second consecutive season, but this will not satisfy the appetite of the Paris Saint-Germain hierarchy.

So, if you want to prove yourself and keep this job, you have to beat Chelsea!

"Playing Pan Yi's Chelsea is nothing more than two ways of thinking."

In the coaching office at the Paris Saint-Germain training base, chief assistant coach Kamara is giving his advice on the knockout rounds.

Kamara is a member of the old Paris White Flag, having played for Paris Saint-Germain for many years as a player.

He joined PSG from Saint-Etienne in the summer of 2007 and remained with the team until his retirement in 2015.

Since retiring in 2015, he has been an assistant coach at Paris Saint-Germain, and in fact he has not been involved in the replacement of the Paris manager, who has since worked with the likes of Unai Emery and Thomas Tuchel.

He has also been playing an important role in the coaching staff because he is a Parisian legend and has a very strong relationship with the players, who affectionately call him "Papus".

"Which two?" Kamala continued:

'One is to play passing, try to keep the ball at your feet and then beat Chelsea with a patient playmaker.

"But to be honest, we don't have any advantage in this area. In the Premier League, Manchester City and Arsenal, who have always been known for their ability to control the ball, have found it difficult to take advantage of Chelsea at their feet. ”

"In today's world football, perhaps only MSN + Habaib's Barcelona can play with Chelsea like this. There may be another one, and that is Pep Guardiola's Bayern. ”

'And our players, in terms of ability, are still quite far behind Chelsea.'

The current Paris Saint-Germain midfield is mainly composed of Matuidi, Motta, Verratti, and new signing Di Maria.

The forward line is tall center forwards like Ibrahimovic and Cavani.

When it comes to technology, it's definitely not bad.

But to say that it can be at the level of the pinnacle Barcelona, and can play fearsome passing football, it is still unrealistic.

If you want to play a pass-and-control style in front of Pan Yi's Chelsea, it is even more impossible.

"The other way is to defend like other teams and wait for the counterattack."

Except for a very small number of teams such as Barcelona and Bayern, the vast majority of teams have adopted the latter style of play when they meet Pan Yi, but there are differences in this.

For example, some teams will try to take the lead in attacking, disrupt the opponent's position, and then defend and counterattack, while others will concentrate on defending and stabilizing their position before counterattacking, or they will really swing the bus, just not conceding the ball and not seeking to score.

In short, the same set of ideas, but the style of play is varied.

Blank knew in his heart that although Camara had proposed two ways of playing for him, he was actually leaning towards the second.

Does he have a choice?

He played Chelsea head-to-head last season and knows what they are capable of.

A year has passed, and the basic lineups of the two teams have not changed very much.

The addition of Di Maria in Paris is a little stronger, but Chelsea has Harry Kane, Goretzka, and the sudden Mbappe......

It feels like Chelsea have strengthened even more, and the tactical changes have been even more abundant.

However, if PSG chooses to play defensive counter-attack, can it hold on?

Although Blanc didn't say it explicitly, everyone in the coaching room understood the manager's worries at this moment.

It can even be said that all teams around the world will have such worries when they meet Pan Yi's Chelsea.

'Even if we play defensively, we can't give up all control to Chelsea. Countless games have taught us that against Chelsea, the midfielders have to keep the opposition at bay. ”

Blank thought for a moment and said.

The last team to be able to stay out against Chelsea is Arsenal.

At that time, Arsene Wenger adopted a tactic of competing with Chelsea in midfield, but was careful not to press it all.

Although they failed to score, they also stifled Chelsea's attacking firepower and resulted in a draw.

Of course, it is not easy to play back and forth with Chelsea in midfield.

Paris Saint-Germain's most common formation this season is 4-3-3, with a combination of Matuidi, Motta and Verratti in midfield.

Of the three, it is often Motta who plays as a single midfielder, while Matuidi and Verratti form an inverted triangle in front of him, playing the duties of two central midfielders.

The problem is that from the point of view of Motta's single back, he can deal with those teams in Ligue 1, but once he encounters a strong team, it is difficult for him to play an effect, and he is easily suppressed by the opponent.

Losing to Real Madrid in the Champions League group stage was just that.

At that time, Real Madrid's three midfielders, Kroos, Casemiro, and Modric, all paid great attention to the suppression of Motta, which also made the Paris Saint-Germain midfield run poorly and finally lost.

In the face of Chelsea, Pan Yi will definitely do the same, which will be a big challenge for Paris Saint-Germain.

'Then withdraw Di Maria and use four midfielders to match Chelsea's three midfielders, maybe that's fine.' Kamala said.

Everyone thought it was a good idea.

Since PSG has two of the world's top centre-forwards, Edinson Cavani and Ibrahimovic, when using 4-3-3 or 4-2-3-1, these two strikers often do not coexist;

Even if it coexists, it is a bit of a waste of his centre-forward attributes to let Cavani play a winger.

And if it's 4-4-2, there's no such problem.

But at the same time, it will create another problem, that is, when playing in the middle four, Paris's midfield defense will indeed grasp well, but the attacking effect will be reduced.

The main reason is that Ibrahimovic and Cavani are actually a bit duplicative in function.

They are the kind of strikers who can be the fulcrum of the front court and can also be the finisher, but compared to the traditional wingers, the breakthrough ability and cross ability are of course inferior.

Blank is well aware of his team's problems, of course, but he is more concerned about whether he can stop Chelsea's attack.

Although sacrificing the team's attack, it is not a bad thing to use four midfielders to suppress Chelsea's three.

——

"Paris Saint-Germain are now suffering from the problems of hoarding too many of the biggest stars up front."

At the Cobham training base, Pan Yi is also conducting a tactical analysis meeting with the coaching staff before the game.

"Paris Saint-Germain has such a problem, they are always blindly piling up superstars, but they can't effectively play the results of the combination of players."

It's really an old problem for the Parisian team.

Money is really rich, but it's really not very good at spending.

From the first day they took charge of the team, the problem of strong offense and weak defense has not been solved, and the problem of too large a gap between the main team and the substitutes has not been solved.

In Pan Yi's previous life, Grand Paris formed the ultra-luxury attack line of Neymar + Messi + Mbappe, which if it claims to be second in world football, no team should dare to say first.

But what about their midfield?

In addition to Verratti, who has always been there, the others are Soler, Pereira, Vitinha, Ruiz......

To be honest, I don't know who they are.

And the same is true of the big Paris of the current timeline.

In addition to world-class strikers such as Cavani and Ibrahimovic, there are also powerful players such as Ravic and Lucas Jr. as substitutes.

The main players in the midfield, Motta, Matuidi, Verratti, and Di Maria, are good, but what about the substitutes?

At the back, only the main central defender Thiago Silva can be regarded as world-class, the 21-year-old Marquinhos can only be said to be okay, and the wing-backs are only at the level of Kurzawa, Maxwell and Van der Wiel.

The main goalkeeper Sirigu, to be honest, is like that, otherwise he would not have mixed into the middle and lower reaches of Serie A later.

How can a team aspiring to perform in the Champions League be the way it is when it comes to building a squad that hasn't changed for years?

It can only be said that Paris Saint-Germain does have problems in the operation of the top management.

Pan Yi actually can't figure it out, won't they copy their homework?

Let's not talk about the Chelsea under Pan Yi now, let's talk about the normal timeline, look at Real Madrid, Barcelona, Bayern, including Atletico Madrid, these teams that have been competitive in the Champions League in recent years, which one is not balanced in strength on three lines?

Perhaps Paris Saint-Germain buys people, mainly to see if there are gimmicks and whether they can attract the attention of the media and fans.

But the problem is that if that's your goal, don't force your grades.

After all, your offensive and defensive lineup will work in Ligue 1, where the overall strength is weak, and it may even be better than the normal lineup, but it will be difficult to work in the Champions League.

And this also brings another problem, that is, I have bought all the superstars, you can't do without them, right?

So Messi has to play, Neymar has to play, Mbappe has to play, and Di Maria has to play...... The manager will be very limited in the formation of the line-up.

The same is true of the current Paris Saint-Germain team, with center forwards like Ibrahimovic and Cavani, ordinary teams can settle down with one, while Grand Paris directly makes two!

This also allowed Pan Yi to guess Blank's troops relatively easily.

'They were beaten twice by us last season and will definitely be more cautious this season. Pan Yi continued:

"So I guess that even if Blank is playing at home, he should be defensive and ready to fight our counter-attack."

"But their three-midfield configuration is definitely not enough to compete with our 3-5-2 system. So I think he'll probably be able to compete with us with a midfield of four and two strikers. ”

'Of course, Blank is not going to use a traditional 4-4-2 because then the midfield is equivalent to two people, but it is weaker.

'Their four midfielders won't be parallel, and the two wing-backs won't be too wide, but they'll be trapezoidal or diamond-shaped, based on the midfield and scrambling.

"And a team like theirs, once you want to defend and are willing to put in the defense, it's a big test for us."

As he spoke, Pan Yi remotely controlled the projector and switched the image to the next PPT, which clearly listed some data of Paris Saint-Germain.

'That's their stats in Ligue 1, they've scored 63 goals and conceded just 12 goals in 25 games, so it's fair to say they've been very good at both ends of the pitch.

"But if you look at the goals they conced, you can see that defensive headers are the number one goal conceded by PSG."

'And most of those headers were headers from corners and indirect free-kicks.

The people present are all experienced professional coaches, and there is no need for Pan Yi to say more, they all know how to take advantage of this.

If Paris Saint-Germain really uses the tactical strategy of 4-4-2 shrinking the defensive midfield, it will indeed be difficult to attack, but if there is a good set-piece tactical cooperation, you can ignore their tactics and tear down the Paris defense.

"Also, this is a technical analysis of Real Madrid's win over Paris Saint-Germain in the Champions League group stage, so let's take a look at it first, and then we'll talk about ......"

Everyone hurried over.

In the knockout rounds of the Champions League, especially in the competition between top teams such as Chelsea and Paris Saint-Germain, although there is a gap in strength, it is not as big as imagined, and no one can easily crush anyone.

Therefore, meticulous preparation before the game and every decision made by the head coach are the key to the outcome of the game.

Luckily, Chelsea have Pan Yi, so the team always has the best pre-match preparation and the right tactical strategy......

——

However, sometimes, the outcome of a match depends on another factor: off-field factors.

Three days later, Chelsea had arrived in Paris and checked into the hotel.

While most people were asleep in Paris at four o'clock in the morning, there was a deafening roar over the hotel where Chelsea was staying.

In the hotel room, Pan Yi sat up from the room suddenly.

"What happened?"

Pan Yi was still a little dazed, and then he saw that there seemed to be bright lights flashing outside the window, and then he heard a shrill sound like an alarm.

In addition to this, there are all kinds of messy human voices and footsteps outside.

Immediately after, there was a knock on his door.

When I opened the door, I found that it was Arteta.

"Someone set off fireworks outside, and it seemed that something was still lit, so the fire alarm was triggered." Arteta rushed in and panted and said, "Let's get the players to safety first." ”

As soon as he heard that it was a fire alarm, Pan Yi quickly rushed out of the door wearing a pair of pajamas, and at this time, the corridor outside was already in chaos.

All the players at Chelsea were awakened.

"Quick, let's all go to the lobby on the first floor. Remember to count the number of people and don't miss anyone. ”

With Pan Yi's loud shout, everyone seemed to have found the backbone of the heart, and they all took action.

In the end, he is a well-trained professional player, or he is very disciplined.

Therefore, even if there was an unexpected situation, he quickly calmed down and quickly went downstairs to the hotel lobby.

At this time, not only them, but all the residents of the entire hotel came down, and some of them didn't even have time to put on their clothes, so they washed down wrapped in quilts.

They're not organized, and it's a mess everywhere.

But it's no wonder that they are, after all, there is a fire alarm, who wouldn't panic?

And it's still the early morning of winter, and it's really unbearable to suddenly come out like this.

"Boss, everyone is not missing, all of them are here." Captain Terry came over to report.

Pan Yi nodded, and went to the hotel manager to ask about the situation.

It turned out that just half an hour ago, a group of people suddenly came to the door of the hotel, and they started to set off fireworks without saying a word.

It's just a fireworks, after all, there is no sound.

But after a while, they actually started to set off loud firecrackers!

This woke up a lot of people.

And that's not all, the fireworks were put on the go, and accidentally lit on a pile of cardboard boxes next to the hotel, so the fire ignited.

"So, there's really nothing wrong with the hotel itself?" Pan Yi asked.

"I guess so." The hotel manager replied and cursed, "I don't know where the drunkard came from, and he went crazy to set off fireworks at our place......"

Pan Yi frowned, then turned to Arteta and said, "You let the players go back to rest first, and there will be a game tomorrow." ”

Arteta said angrily: "How can it be so coincidental that a group of people suddenly come here and set off fireworks? These people are clearly Paris Saint-Germain people! They just don't want us to recharge our energy and go to the race! ”

Pan Yi nodded lightly: "I understand." But it's okay now, the impact is not very big, let's let them go to sleep first. ”

Arteta nodded and left.

Outside the hotel, reporters with a keen sense of smell had already rushed over, and Pan Yi, who was standing in the hotel lobby, quickly squeezed over.

Pan Yi didn't shirk it, and talked eloquently to the camera in pajamas:

"It's not uncommon to set off fireworks in front of the opponent's hotel before the game, to be honest."

"But are your firecrackers going to be a little too loud? I also lit the cardboard box next to it. ”

"Do you have a sense of public morality? The neighbors have to go to work tomorrow! ”

'And I would say that Chelsea are not afraid of such off-the-beaten-track moves.

'The opposition fans do this because they are afraid of coming up against a Chelsea team that is in perfect condition, so they will try to prevent Chelsea from playing at their best.

'But unfortunately, even if Chelsea weren't 100 per cent, we would have won tomorrow's game!'

"Want to play? Let's have fun with you on the field! ”

——

Harassment of Chelsea at the hotel and Pan Yi's declaration of war on Paris Saint-Germain spread early on the internet.

Some people think that Paris Saint-Germain fans have not done this kind of thing once or twice, like in their national derby with Marseille, the two sides often engage in this kind of thing.

And some people think that this may not have anything to do with Paris Saint-Germain, it was purely an accident, who made Chelsea unlucky?

The two sides held different opinions on the Internet and quarreled.

Of course, most people still support Chelsea, because PSG's reputation is really not good right now, and there is a feeling that everyone is shouting at them, both at the top and among the fans.

It's just that for Pan Yi, the commotion in the early morning still affected the team's pre-game preparations.

After all, even if they are only noisy for an hour or two, the players may not be able to fall asleep immediately when they go back in shock, and even if they do, the quality of sleep is average.

After all, players are just like ordinary people, once they don't sleep well at night, they will be out of energy all day the next day.

As a result, Pan Yi and the coaching staff had to temporarily adjust the team's game day plans and arrangements, especially to increase the rest time of the players.

As a result, there is less time to go to the Parc des Princes to acclimatise and train.

But there is no way, there is always a trade-off.

Chelsea fans are starting to worry about their squad's current situation.

After all, in professional football, many times the outcome of a game is determined by the details before the game.

The coach's tactical game, the collection of various data, the pre-match training, the state of the players, including the support of the fans...... And so on, no matter which link goes wrong, it may affect the game.

Now that the Chelsea players are not getting a good rest and have changed their normal training schedules, it could be a question of whether the players will still be able to play at their best when they play.

When it was evening and the fans had already begun to enter the Parc des Princes, Chelsea fans put up signs in the visiting stands to despise the behaviour of the PSG fans:

"Setting off fireworks in front of someone else's hotel won't win the Champions League!"