Mission accomplished for Frédéric Antonetti. In a handful of months, the 61-year-old technician managed to relaunch and maintain Strasbourg in Ligue 1. Maintenance assured on Saturday at La Meinau, after a draw against the Parisian French champion (1-1). “I’m happy to have done it at La Meinau. The players had a good match, the draw was fairly fair, we had a good match against Paris, who have incredible flashes and it’s difficult to take the ball from them,” said Antonetti, singing the praises of ” Messi, Mbappé, Verratti, world-class players”. He turned into a lawyer for a PSG who makes “a beautiful champion. It’s an honor to have this kind of team in the league, let’s never forget that! Being able to play against high-level players… I take this opportunity to say that the criticisms are sometimes unjustified. It’s an honor to play against PSG.
If the PSG is criticized, it is that the men of Christophe Galtier have generally failed during the second part of the season, eliminated in the round of 16 of the Coupe de France and the Champions League. They were also pushed to their limits in the league. All with an often mediocre quality of play and scares even against the weakest L1 teams. Not to mention the matches where the Rouge et Bleu “mentally let go”, as Christophe Galtier himself admitted after the debacle against Lorient (1-3).
And tactically, we can see that the coaches don’t have to rack their brains too much to shake up the fragile Parisian edifice… We don’t see any fear either. “When we analyze Paris, we sweat wondering how we are going to do it,” corrects Antonetti, believing that against PSG, “we are never safe from acceleration. Even if you play a good game, you have chances… In fact, it’s not acceleration, but flashes, they see everything before everyone else. I’ve already said what I think of Paris: they marched on Real Madrid for two and a half hours (in 2022), and we only remembered the last quarter of an hour (3-1 defeat on the return after a 1-0 victory in the first leg and after leading 1-0 for a long time in the return, editor’s note)… It’s not being a winner. I do not share at all the analyzes that I can hear and read”, he deciphers again, assuring that “even Manchester City does not walk around against Paris Saint-Germain”.
Moreover, the native of Venzolasca recalls that “City has not yet won the European Cup (final on June 10 against Inter Milan for Guardiola’s men, editor’s note), but they do not question anything , they continue. That’s football: you have to keep going and do it again.” Not sure that the Parisian leaders follow this advice, with the future of Christophe Galtier which should quickly be sealed… Still, “yes, he is a good champion, according to Fred Antonetti. Afterwards, I didn’t see all their matches, but they took the points, they have a style of play. Afterwards, there are hazards. It was a season with the World Cup in the middle… There are a lot of things to review in the organization of football. You just have to be in bad shape the day you have to go to the European Cup and you have the impression that the season is over … ”Words that will warm the heart of Christophe Galtier, that’s for sure .
