Despite Champions League Victory, PSG's Front 3 Fails to Impress Once Again

Paris Saint-Germain have failed to convince in the early part of the new campaign, and despite the 3-1 win over Bulgarian side Ludogorets Razgrad in Wednesday's UEFA Champions League fixture, it was far from reassuring.

Manager Unai Emery was facing pressure before their trip to face the Bulgarian champions at the Vasil Levski Stadium in Sofia. After drawing at home to Arsenal in their opening group-stage game, things looked to be back on track for the Parisians until the 2-0 loss to Toulouse on Friday.

"We know that we can do more than we’ve shown in the league until now," captain Thiago Silva told the media at PSG's pre-match press conference. "We haven’t made a great start to the season. We know we can do better. We will give everything for the team. We have to be very motivated because, after the draw in the first game, this is a very important result for us. We are very motivated to claim all three points."

The Ligue 1 champions picked up the maximum return from their Bulgarian road trip, but they were made to work for the result and were far from convincing.

Ludogorets started the game much the stronger of the two sides, inviting PSG on to them and looking to strike on the counter.

Captain Cosmin Moti in defence and midfielder Svetoslav Dyakov were pulling the strings, fighting hard to win the ball back, then looking long for the pace of Wanderson, Marcelinho and Jonathan Cafu.

Ironically, it was everything PSG had shown in pre-season, breaking with speed and purpose, accurate balls in behind and providing a constant menace.

It paid off after 15 minutes. Winning a free-kick on the edge of the PSG box, Natanael Pimienta powered his effort through the collapsing wall—looking at you, Edinson Cavani—and past Alphonse Areola to give the home side a shock 1-0 lead.

When PSG destroyed Olympique Lyonnais 4-1 in the season-opening Trophee des Champions, they looked much different than they have recently.

Lyon were blown away. The combinations between PSG's front line were devastating and exciting.

That was vastly different for large parts of Wednesday's game, and it’s been a problem this season. Sluggish, dull and lacking ideas—behind the attack, the midfield trio of Marco Verratti, Blaise Matuidi and Thiago Motta harks back to the days of former boss Laurent Blanc. The criticisms remain the same.

Yet the Spanish coach fails to see the overall problems it causes.

"We absolutely had to stay calm when we conceded the goal; we had to play with confidence," Emery said post-match, according to the club website. He continued:

"

That's how the players' qualities come to the fore. Tonight, the most important thing is the win. The goal just before half-time did us the world of good and we were able to play our game in the second half. This win is a deserved one. Tonight I decided to field the midfield trio of Verratti, Motta and Matuidi and they stepped up. But when I field other players, they will live up to expectations as well.

"

When you want your team to be well-organised and disciplined, they are superb. However, they won't give you a great deal of creativity in the final third.

Combine that with the three forwards, who are also failing to jell; it's a recipe for exactly what we saw in the first half.

Before the break, Matuidi did what he loves to do: broke the line of the back four, picked up Verratti's pass and finished low in the corner to level the scores.

You felt from that moment that PSG were always going to win the game, but nothing was guaranteed.

It was a mixed night for Cavani. The FourFourTwo Stats Zone graphic below emphasises the lack of influence the 29-year-old had on the game:

Ten minutes after the break, the Uruguayan superbly headed in Angel Di Maria's left-footed free-kick. As he showed against Arsenal, that's one area of his game where you can't criticise El Matador. The former Napoli man is still deadly in aerial situations when the delivery is on point.

The moment that killed the contest off came just five minutes later. Ludogorets won a penalty when Motta bizarrely dived head-first into Marcelinho's feet.

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Moti took the spot-kick, but it was a poor effort, and Areola saved the penalty. PSG went up the other end, Lucas fed Cavani and the forward's shot took a deflection before beating Vladislav Stoyanov.

Against teams of the same level as Ludogorets, that kind of performance will be more than enough for PSG and Cavani, but he will need to improve and get more involved if his team wants to find success in the knockout stages.

According to Stats Zone, he only attempted 21 passes, created two chances and had six attempts on goal:

What is more worrying from Emery's point of view is the lack of understanding and teamwork between the front three.

Di Maria, although he played the ball in for Cavani's first goal, only found the Uruguayan with one other pass throughout the entire game.

The Argentinian was everywhere, playing as a winger, a No. 10 and a central midfielder all in the same game. However, "jack of all trades, master of none" springs to mind. He did bits of everything but failed to excel at any of it.

If Cavani isn't involved, that isn't all his fault—you have to provide him with the service to thrive. With the midfield lacking creativity and support not coming from the wide areas, it creates a disjointed attacking performance.

PSG were lucky in the league when Dijon handed them opportunities. Toulouse didn't, and they picked up the three points.

As Ludogorets found out in the first half, it only takes one defensive error to lose a goal, but the longer the tournament goes on, those chances are less forthcoming.

It raises the question: Where is the PSG team that we saw against Lyon? Hatem Ben Arfa played as the No. 9 and was invisible, but the other attacking players, playing in the 4-2-3-1, were stunning.

Javier Pastore spent the whole of Wednesday's game on the bench, and you have to wonder what the Argentinian playmaker has to do to get another opportunity to play in the role he craves.

The 4-3-3 formation hasn't worked for Emery. It's not how he played with Sevilla, and it feels strange that he continues to push on with it after the disappointing performances this season.

He needs to go back to his roots and the way he found success previously. If not, there will be questions asked as to who is calling the shots at the Parisian club.