BEVERLY HILLS, April 29, (THEWILL) – In a display of heroic discipline and resilient fightback, English Premier League champions-in-waiting, Manchester City, successfully overturned a goal deficit to earn an all-important away victory with goals from Kevin De Bruyne and Riyad Mahrez against Ligue 1 giants Paris Saint-Germain in the first leg of their UEFA Champions League semi-final fixture at the Parc des Princes on Wednesday.
The visitors fought back to turn the tie around and were good enough to take a 2-1 victory back home to Manchester, where they will host the return fixture on the pedestal of this victorious advantage. But, they had to work tenaciously for the victory and though it might appear glossy on paper, it was anything but.
For the first time in a long time, City appeared ineffectually stumped in the first half that was dominated by the hosts in a thrilling half of football. Pep Guardiola must have ironed out the chinks at the interval because they came out the other side a more inspiring side.
The quarter-of-an-hour lead the hosts took into the break from a glancing Marquinhos header from Angel di Maria’s devilishly whipped corner could have easily been two or three goals to the good for PSG but as Neymar, Di Maria and Kylian Mbappe were causing City’s defence no end of headaches, they could not increase the goal count.
That allowed City back into the tie as they rediscovered something of themselves in the second period. The goal that their second half display merited came four minutes after the hour mark and it did no favours for the unity of the PSG defense.
It was De Bruyne’s goal and there were no surprises because the Belgian was made for the biggest games and biggest stages. When his cross curled to nestle in the net, there was no mistaking the blame that the defense laid on PSG keeper, Keylor Navas.
But, the keeper had his defense to blame in return when City pulled ahead through Mahrez. With 19 minutes from regulation time, PSG lined up a wall to guard their goal from a City free-kick. When Mahrez stepped up and sent a curler straight on, a patchy PSG wall allowed the ball through and gave Navas little in the way of preventing it from going in.
The pace of the second half was not suiting for the game plan of the hosts and once again Guardiola’s tactical application of the substitution was crucial because three minutes after taking off João Cancelo and introducing Oleksandr Zinchenko, the latter produced the assist for De Bruyne’s leveller.
PSG could do without a red card at this point but that was exactly what they got when Idrissa Gueye lunged in on Ilkay Gundogan and was shown a straight red card that he could not fight. Gundogan needed to be attended to on the pitch for a while but he was finally able to continue.
Guardiola’s side will fancy their chances of reaching the UCL final for the first time in the club’s history as they return home with two away goals in the bag. There is still a lot to play for and the pair of Neymar and Mbappe can make a difference home and away as they did against Bayern Munich and Barcelona respectively.
But, City has a foot in the door. And, it is not an easy venture dislodging them from such a vantage position. The two sides will play again to determine who sails through on Tuesday next week.
About the Author
Jude Obafemi is a versatile senior Correspondent at THEWILL Newspapers, excelling in sourcing, researching, and delivering sports news stories for both print and digital publications.
