PSG – Lille

The Parisians should justify their status of favourites in today’s match

On Matchday 24 of the French championship, PSG play Lille at home. The encounter promises to be a hot one, as both teams must play to win. Lille are in the race for the Eurocup spot and sit fifth, five points behind fourth place. A points loss here is unacceptable. And PSG still lead the standings with a five-point lead, which looks secure. However, the Parisians have lost their last three games, something that has not happened for a very long time. However, the defeats happened in three different tournaments. First, they crashed out of the French Cup at the hands of Marseille (1-2), then they lost in Ligue 1 to Monaco (1-3) and, the week before, they were beaten at home by Bayern (0-1). Tension is building around the Paris team. Not only head coach Christophe Galtier is under pressure, but also PSG's main stars, including Messi and Neymar. So they need to rehabilitate themselves. That said, the opposition is strong enough to make that task difficult for the Parisian team. In the last two rounds, Lille beat Rennes (3-1) and Strasbourg (2-0), looking confident and calm. However, in between these victories there was a penalty shoot-out defeat at the hands of Lyon in the French Cup. Lille will have extra motivation for the game against PSG, not only because of the tournament fight and the level of the irritant itself. But also because of the history of recent encounters. In the first leg, Lille managed to lose at home to Paris 1-7. And in the previous game they lost 1-5. A monstrous statistic. Although at the beginning of the season Lille looked very different and were weaker than now. PSG were still fresh and enthusiastic but now they are more focused on the Champions League and make a lot of mistakes in Ligue 1, where their stars lack attitude and concentration.