Angel Di Maria's Midfield Freedom Gives PSG Champions League X-Factor

Heading into Wednesday’s UEFA Champions League clash between Paris Saint-Germain and Chelsea, there will still have been a few lay fans—mostly in England—who read Angel Di Maria’s name in the lineups and scoffed. While an undoubtedly world-class player, his stint in the Premier League was disastrous, and that has shaped a still-faintly visible delusion that he’s not a top-class player.

Well, the player himself smashed that theory to pieces at Stamford Bridge.

Zipping across the park with vigour seen in every stage of his career other than the Manchester United one, he tore the Blues apart with dynamic movement, precise crossing and energetic give-and-go play. Even the most ardent of Di Maria doubters will have admitted defeat as the full-time whistle blew in west London midweek.

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When he’s used correctly and his confidence is flowing, he represents a near-unstoppable force. For those who haven’t kept tabs on the Argentinian’s season in Paris but harbour an affection for a player once considered one of the best in the world, hearts will have been warmed to see him approaching his zenith again over two legs against Chelsea.

It’s fair to say Manchester United didn’t use him particularly well, and while there were, of course, other factors at play during his rough ride in England—a home burglary entirely unsettling him from his work on the pitch—United manager Louis van Gaal failed, tactically, to unlock this brilliant, obscenely talented footballer.

In LVG’s rigid system focused on short build-up and ball retention, the dynamism of Di Maria was entirely wasted. Van Gaal rarely played the Argentinian in a central position so he could pick the ball up and just go, weaving around hapless defenders and breaking between the lines, and often stuck him out on the left side, asking him to swing in too many crosses from isolated positions.

Di Maria’s best football at Real Madrid quite clearly came from a central role—he was the forward-breaking runner of a midfield three in a 4-3-3—and he was the best player on the pitch the night Los Blancos finally hauled in La Decima in 2014.

For Argentina, he thrived most often on the right side (when Lionel Messi wasn’t playing there), utilising a different skill set but still retaining the option to surge forward and commit defenders.

So to see Laurent Blanc giving Di Maria the keys to the attack and encouraging his natural flair to shine through is a masterstroke. Not only is that the only way it will have been possible to rekindle the Argentinian’s confidence and restore him to the player he was two years ago, but it’s also the best route forward if Paris Saint-Germain are to win the Champions League this season.

Zlatan Ibrahimovic, Edinson Cavani and Lucas Moura are very good, make no mistake, but Di Maria—in his pomp—is a cut above. He’s the level of player who can make the difference against the very, very best on a consistent basis.

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The teamsheets had Di Maria, ostensibly, on the right flank on Wednesday night, but in reality he wasn’t given a defined position. The system PSG used was as fluid, as you’ll see, with Di Maria switching flanks and dropping into central areas to pick the ball up and drive onward. Lucas did a good job filling in the space that opened up as a result, taking an ad hoc approach to where he should be on the pitch.

On Wednesday, when Chelsea sank into a deep set, Thiago Motta would often hand the ball off to Di Maria and let him drive forward. The Argentinian is equally adept at beating a man to open space and supplying a killer pass/cross. It was his ball for Ibrahimovic that created the first goal (scored by Adrien Rabiot), and it was his inch-perfect cross that supplied the Swede with the second.

In the first leg, Di Maria was the one who lifted the beautiful ball in behind for Edinson Cavani to slam home, giving PSG a vital one-goal advantage, and was also responsible for the cutting pass that set Lucas Moura in on goal earlier on.

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It was 172 minutes of freedom unlike anything he’s experienced this season—Di Maria is not usually this fluid in terms of positioning and influence—but it might just be the way it must be as PSG look toward the quarter-finals.

The influence he can have on a game is undeniable, and history suggests he can pick the lock if you allow him to. He was the only Real Madrid player who was able to break through Diego Simeone’s Atletico Madrid wall in the derbies when he participated in them, and after his exit, Los Blancos have done almost nothing other than lose to their stingy neighbours.

PSG won’t need Di Maria to be quite so all-encompassing in the future as Marco Verratti—sorely missed on Wednesday, evidenced by the tremendous number of dangerous turnovers Motta and Rabiot combined for in deep midfield—will return to the XI. But Real Madrid, in 2014, won the Champions League with Di Maria acting as the heartbeat of their side from a central position, and as Blanc has now seen, he can still have that same dizzying effect on a game.

Every team needs an X-Factor if they stand any hope of winning Europe’s premier competition, and in Di Maria, PSG have theirs.

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