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Now Manchester City are found on the wrong side of the dotted line. With a game to go, they have sunk to their lowest point. Crowned officially the best team in Europe 19 months ago, the table says they are now only the 25th finest in this competition. They were not merely beaten by Paris Saint-Germain. They were battered, their flaws highlighted by the team who had looked the Champions League’s greatest underachievers.
City were overpowered, overrun, overcome. With a home game against Club Brugge, they can still salvage a play-off place. But if the continent’s finest used to be scared at the prospect of playing them in knockout ties, now they could be salivating.
For PSG, this was a seminal, sensational comeback to cap a spectacular match. But for City, it was an unwanted encore, déjà vu all over again in the French capital. A team with a solitary point from their last four Champions League games would have nine if they could hold on to a lead. They were a goal up against Sporting CP, three to the good against Feyenoord. They went 2-0 up in Paris and had their advantage cancelled out in the space of five minutes. They creaked until Joao Neves cracked them open. He was a symbolic figure to determine the game: City lacked the zip and zest of a younger PSG in the centre of the park and a 20-year-old midfielder helped decide it, before Goncalo Ramos clinched it.
Rodri was at the Parc des Princes, but City missed him as he sat in the stands. Yet such was PSG’s dominance that City could have required two Rodris to halt Neves, Vitinha and Fabian Ruiz. Kevin de Bruyne and Mateo Kovacic looked dead on their feet when replaced, but it got worse without them. City were limited to 36 per cent of possession, Pep Guardiola animated even by his standards, his histrionics a sign of his dissatisfaction.
Because the scoreline only tells part of the story. Four goals could easily have been eight. City were saved by a goal-line clearance, Josko Gvardiol denying Fabian Ruiz, by two offside decisions when Achraf Hakimi slotted into an empty net, when Ousmane Dembele thought he had scored his second, by the woodwork, rattled by Dembele’s rasping, rising shot.
In a touchline battle between former Barcelona teammates, it first seemed as though Guardiola had made the pivotal substitution, as an unusually productive Jack Grealish scored one goal and made another. Yet Luis Enrique’s gambit of introducing Dembele proved decisive. He added incision to their first-half excellence and another replacement, Ramos, struck in injury time.
It amounted to a magnificent advertisement for 26th against 24th, the positions they occupied at kick-off. Previous failures rendered it compelling. The two teams made it coruscating. PSG made for worthy winners.
Especially given the context, when they had felt luckless in this competition and were somehow 2-0 down. If the sense was that Grealish was brought at half-time to add the control City had been lacking, it instead yielded the anarchy of four goals in 15 minutes. The £100m man had about as decisive a burst as he has had in a City shirt and yet it counted for nothing. His only previous City goal since 2023 was a penalty against Salford.
An unexpected, and unexpectedly incisive, foray from Manuel Akanji took him to the byline. He found Bernardo Silva, whose shot was blocked by Gianluigi Donnarumma but Grealish was on hand to hook in the rebound. Then Grealish’s deflected cross fell invitingly for Erling Haaland to score his second goal since signing his nine-and-a-half year contract.
PSG, meanwhile, ploughed a different furrow, without a true No 9. They went on to score four goals. They had a substitute on the scoresheet, Dembele slotting in a shot from Bradley Barcola’s cutback. The catalytic Barcola found the net with the rebound after Desire Doue curled a shot against the bar. The previous time City visited the Parc des Princes, they faced arguably the most star-studded forward line ever assembled, in Kylian Mbappe, Lionel Messi and Neymar. Last night, they struggled against the French trio of Dembele, Doue and Barcola when they were teamed.
And City had lost in Lisbon, been turned over in Turin. Now they were put under attack in Paris. Their hosts were relentless. Joao Neves had missed a headed chance at the back post in the opening minutes. He scored one at the end, plunging forward to meet Vitinha’s free kick and plant his header past Ederson. When Ramos then placed a shot beyond the goalkeeper, City had conceded 13 goals in their last four Champions League games. It is evidence, if nothing else, of why they have signed two young defenders this week. But neither was eligible here and perhaps neither will get to play in Europe this season. Because now City are on the brink.
