Outmuscled, outthought and outplayed before the break, Manchester United rallied; and their Champions League adventure will continue in the group stage if they are braver from the return leg’s outset.
After their debut in the big time of elite continental competition, Marc Skinner and his players can take succour from a second half that pinned Paris Saint-Germain back. That display provides the blueprint for the manager’s team talk next week.
United went behind to Tabitha Chawinga’s breakaway strike on 53 minutes yet remained calm, moved upfield, and the on-loan forward from Lyon, Melvine Malard, headed an equaliser to leave the tie poised enticingly.
Watched by Sarina Wiegman and David de Gea, pedigree suggested PSG would arrive undaunted as veterans of two finals (2015 and 2017) and dominate. They did just that before Skinner’s replacements, Malard and Geyse – both Champions League winners – spun fortunes United’s way.
Skinner was bullish pre-match and buoyant afterwards. “No chance is it an upset if we go there and win,” said the manager. “We need to match their physicality and play with no fear – we’re the better footballing team.”
Of the game he said: “It was the cliche of two halves – what a shift in 45 minutes.” It was. In the opening 45, United were overrun and in need of someone to take hold of the ball and calm the tempo. But no candidate stepped forward and so what Skinner warned of – PSG’s penchant for squeezing the play and taking charge – became the pattern.
As the home crowd chanted “we want Glazers out” and United, at last, managed an upfield foray, Oriane Jean-François collapsed and was stretchered off, the defender holding her shirt over her face in distress. This did not disrupt PSG. Mary Earps had to fling herself high to beat away a fierce Sandy Baltimore effort.
United’s strategy was to cling on and hope for a lucky break and they nearly received one. Jean-François’s replacement, Clare Hunt, tipped a weak pass back towards Constance Picaud that forced the visiting goalkeeper to take out the onrushing Lucía García. United yelled for a penalty but the referee, Frida Klarlund, was unmoved.
While Hannah Blundell, at centre-back, had a runners-up medal from her time at Chelsea, Skinner chose to leave out Geyse, a winner with Barcelona last season. But he moved to remedy this for the second half.
The Brazilian was the difference. “She gives you a different level,” said Skinner. Experience and class was the Geyse cocktail, a mazy run and blaze at goal indicative of her quality. Another dribble at PSG followed and already the French side were having to answer far more questions than before.
A Picaud hoof straight out of play showed how rushed they were. But, suddenly, disaster struck for United: a quick break and PSG applied a sucker punch, Chawinga skating through and coolly beating Earps.
The PSG bench flooded the touchline in celebration, United’s retreated. Seconds later, after a corner, Élisa De Almeida was the subject of a handball shout but the defender escaped.
García, Geyse and Leah Galton were a frontline intent on doing what PSG did – suffocating the rearguard and prospering from there. Galton went closest first, her curving inside run from the left ending with a shot that ended up in the side-netting.
Now, though, Malard intervened to make next Wednesday in Paris fascinating. As Skinner said: “In the second half we unleashed the players that did the business that they did. That’s the fastest [team] we’ve played against. In the second half we had them on the ropes and I felt we could take the game. Next week will be the winner.”
