PSG: "It's easy to get the ball out, the front three don't defend", Reims captain Abdelhamid tackles the MNM

It's the return of the Parisian 7+3.

Paris Saint-Germain was held in check by Stade de Reims at the Parc des Princes on Sunday (1-1) and Yunis Abdelhamid delivered one of the keys that allowed the Champenois to resist the leader of the French championship.

“We have analyzed them, we know their weaknesses.

We know that it does not defend much in front, ”smiled Yunis Abdelhamid, pointing to the lack of defensive involvement of the MNM.

Against Reims, Christophe Galtier lined up Neymar, Lionel Messi and Kylian Mbappé together at kick-off for the first time since the Qatari World Cup.

Abdelhamid on the 3 stars of PSG:

"In the ball outings, it was easy, the 3 in front do not defend. We knew that from the moment we passed this 1st curtain... They no longer participate in the defensive tasks of their team. We worked on that" #PSGSDR pic.twitter.com/Rh0vPwIihQ

— JS Grond-Tran (@JS_Grond) January 29, 2023

The Reims captain did not sense his "feverish" opponents and pointed to their quality with the ball, highlighting all the more the Parisian shortcomings in the defensive phase.

"In the ball outings, it's easy as the front three don't defend," he said in the mixed zone.

We knew that from the moment we passed this first curtain… They always make the effort to press a little bit but from the moment they made this effort, they no longer participate in the defensive tasks of their team.

We worked on that and we wanted to exploit it.

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Once that first line was cleared, Reims "found themselves playing against seven players", which allowed Will Still's team to create many chances, although they did not materialize their chances enough, from Captain's own admission.

"We knew that by implementing these ideas, in our way of pressing, by recovering the ball high enough, we were going to cause them problems," explained the Reims coach.

After defeats in Lens (3-1) and Rennes (1-0) in January, this new hitch questions two weeks before the shock in the knockout stages of the Champions League against Bayern, forced to draw for the third times in three games this weekend.

Christophe Galtier is aware of the insufficient performance of his players.

"I don't think there is any form of crisis of confidence," he said after the match.

Perhaps a crisis of complacency.

All the requirement that we had has gone out of order.

It is difficult to restart on this requirement, on the fact of playing as a team with or without the ball.

There were some interesting things, but currently we do not find that.

I have high level players who cannot accept being at this level since the beginning of the year.

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