The solution to PSG’s European woes – Enrique is the perfect Champions League manager

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Spot in semi-finals confirmed 

©IMAGO

Paris Saint-Germain were forced to work for their spot in the semi-finals of the Champions League on Thursday night, but the Ligue 1 giants won’t mind. After going two goals up at Villa Park, Luis Enrique’s side then sweated through the second half, when Aston Villa came from behind to ultimately finish the game as 3-2 winners. Despite the spirited performance from Unai Emery’s side, PSG went through on aggregate after winning the first leg in Paris 3-1. 

The result means that PSG have advanced to the penultimate round of the European competition in back-to-back seasons for the first time since 2021 and there’s little doubt that the French giants have their Spanish tactician to thank for that. After guiding the club to the semi-finals of the competition in his first season in charge, Luis Enrique was hell bent on repeating the trick and perhaps even going one step further this time around. And when we consider the 54-year-old’s record in the Champions League to date, it would certainly suggest that PSG have finally found the solution to their European woes. 

Indeed, while Enrique is only taking part in his fifth campaign in the Champions League due to spending four years in charge of the Spanish national team, his record in Europe is nothing short of incredible. In his first season in the competition as Barcelona manager, Enrique guided the Spanish giants to their fourth and last Champions League title to date. After that, he then took the LaLiga side to back-to-back quarter-finals, before departing the club to take up his aforementioned role with Spain. Now back in domestic football and intent on winning the tournament again, Enrique is seemingly picking up where he left off now at the Parisian club. 

As we can see in the table above, Enrique’s record to date stands at 1.98 points per game after 36 wins, six draws and just 16 defeats across five seasons. When we compare the Spaniard to every other head coach in the tournament since his debut season in 2014/15, it suggests that Enrique has in fact been the fourth best head coach in the Champions League in that time. When we discount managers that have coached fewer than 40 matches in the competition, only three managers stand tall with a better points per game record than the PSG boss: Zinédine Zidane (2.02), Pep Guardiola (2.06) and Carlo Ancelotti (2.09). And, perhaps to Enrique’s good fortune, only one of them remains in this season’s tournament.