In the space of a year, PSG have become a team many neutrals actively willed to lose in the Champions League – to the best team in the world to watch.
Fittingly, two of the figureheads of the ‘old PSG’ – who were more about egos than a team – were both on the wrong side of 4-0 hammerings in the US.
It was Lionel Messi’s Inter Miami in the last 16 and Kylian Mbappe’s Real Madrid in Wednesday’s one-sided last-four tie.
Since Mbappe, PSG’s all-time top scorer, left last summer for Madrid when his contract expired, Enrique has built a new-look frontline.
Dembele, Desire Doue and Khvicha Kvaratskhelia are electric. Sometimes Bradley Barcola is in there to cause mayhem too.
Their midfield three – Portugal duo Joao Neves and Vitinha, and two-goal Spaniard Ruiz – control games.
Ex-Chelsea midfielder John Obi Mikel said on Dazn at half-time: “When the three in the middle dictate the play like that, no-one can stop them. It has been a masterclass.”
Former Newcastle striker Callum Wilson added: “Some of that football from PSG was like watching Fifa. Incredible.”
And that is without mentioning non-stop up-and-down attacking full-backs Achraf Hakimi and Nuno Mendes, who are also a big part of how PSG play.
And having won the French Cup, Ligue 1 and Champions League, they are now just one game away from a fourth major trophy of 2025. Throw in the lesser Trophee des Champions and it could be a clean sweep of five.
Chelsea will have their work cut out to stop them on Sunday. Dating back to the Coupe de France final, PSG have won their last five knockout round matches by a combined score of 18-0.
Luis Enrique must now be considered one of the elite managers in world football, having won Trebles with Barcelona and PSG.
“He has set the standard,” said Welshman Bale. “They are leading a new era.
“They have set a very high bar and everyone in football will be trying to copy them and trying to stop them.”
The only concern for PSG could be fatigue.
Sunday will be their 65th match since the start of the 2024-25 campaign. Exactly a month after that game they face Tottenham in the Uefa Super Cup to start 2025-26.
