Chelsea Facing PSG for 3rd Time Running: Revenge and the Rubber Match
If once is an accident, if twice is a pattern and thrice a trend, whatever is happening with Chelsea and Paris Saint-Germain has reached some distinction of rivalry.
For the third consecutive season—and second straight year in the UEFA Champions League's round of 16—a group-winning west London side have been paired with arguably the toughest second-place outfit, Ligue 1's dominant force, PSG.
In 2013/14, manager Jose Mourinho, after nearly 120 minutes of fraught football, sprinted down his touchline following Demba Ba's late heroics, and the Blues found themselves in the UCL semi-finals.
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One hundred and fifty minutes of football was necessary to split the 2014/15 meeting, with David Luiz and Thiago Silva away goals proving enough to secure progression into the quarter-finals (despite Zlatan Ibrahimovic being red-carded).
Meeting again, both as champions of their respective leagues, this season has an altogether different tone than the previous two.
Paris Saint-Germain are unbeaten in Ligue 1.
Laurent Blanc's men have played 18 league matches and boast an impressive 15-3-0 record, building a goal difference of 36. Adding Angel Di Maria in the summer transfer window from Manchester United, at the cost of £44 million, an argument could be made this PSG edition are vastly improved from last year—the same cannot be said across the English Channel.
Chelsea are languishing.
Nearer relegation than mid-table, nearer mid-table then challenging for their crown, the Premier League's defending champions are—putting it kindly—shambolic.
Sixteenth in England's top division, one point from the bottom three, what is transpiring at Stamford Bridge this season cannot be easily explained nor simply solved. Rising from the depths of relegation to the top four seems an Everest to climb. Ever increasingly, Mourinho's best chance of retaining his club's Champions League position is winning the competition outright.
Though not under the Portuguese's stewardship, Chelsea did something similar in 2011/12. Finishing outside the top four for the first time in over a decade, their saving grace was beating Bayern Munich in the 2012 Champions League final, securing another season in the world's most prestigious club-cup competition.
Another miraculous run must happen for them to hear the famed UCL theme in 2016/17. The first hurdle in that mission is ousting a rampant PSG.
Often football clubs move between mental blocks; when struggling, the pressure to play in one's league becomes a burden.
Chelsea carry an Atlas-like weight to hold their domestic season together, and each goal conceded is a body blow to those efforts. Losing at home to Crystal Palace, Southampton, Liverpool and Bournemouth, the tense Stamford Bridge atmosphere can be felt a world away, and that environment is not conducive to winning matches.
Cup competitions (be it the League Cup, FA Cup or Champions League) can sometimes be an oasis, an escape, a refuge.
Earning 13 points in six matches—from an admittedly weak group consisting of Dynamo Kiev, FC Porto and Maccabi Tel Aviv—the Blues might find solace in seeing Champions League shirts hanging in their dressing room, rather than the Premier League's burdensome fashion statements.
Moreover, there is a revenge factor. Chelsea had the juice last season, and PSG—feeling aggrieved after 2013/14's quarter-final loss—returned with vengeance on their minds.
Roles have reversed this season: The Parisians now have the crown, and it is Chelsea's job to knock them off, avenging 2014/15's crushing round-of-16 defeat.
The Blues have three forms of motivation in this season's opening knock-out round: revenge, the cup and the carrot of 2016/17 qualification. Their primary issue is PSG have more in-form players, higher confidence and will be receiving the benefit of a winter break.
Mourinho, conversely, must battle through an arduous Christmas schedule, not knowing if his fragile vessel will shipwreck before February 16's all-important first leg at the Parc des Princes.
Standing at Chelsea 1-1 Paris Saint-Germain over the last two seasons, it appears next goal wins.
*Stats via WhoScored.com; transfer fees via Soccerbase where not noted.
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