We are (not) the Champions
This past Sunday, August 23. The international soccer fandom held its breath as the first international-scale sporting Championship since no-sports played out. What am I talking about? Who won? Why should you care? All this and more in your introduction recap and conclusion (look, life moves pretty fast sometimes, if you don’t stop to look around a while, ya just might miss it) to THE CHAMPIONS LEAGUE
What even IS the Champions League??
So, in America, we have these competitions called “All Star Games” or “Pro Bowls” where we for some reason (read: to make more monies) take the top players from leagues and have them all play in one spectacular game. well, the Champions League is like that, for European soccer leagues, only on steroids (not literally. I mean, I hope not anyways. Stay clean y’all, looking @ you, RUSSIA).
Each year, the top teams from the European divisions get to compete for basically, the most coveted title in club football. Winning the Champions League (aka UCL) is the pinnacle of the soccer season; crowning this year’s GOAT. Teams qualify based on their finish in their national league the previous year, the league winner gets a guaranteed spot and then, depending on the league, the runners-up might get a spot too (this gets complicated but for reasons based on historically good leagues and general unfairness, some leagues are considered '“more competitive'“ and get to enter up to 4 teams. This is the case for the Premier League). Teams that are amongst the top national league finishers but aren’t quite la crème de la crème compete in a secondary league called the Europa League. It’s fine.
How does it work?
Similar to our favorite competition, the World Cup, the Champions League starts with a group stage of 32 teams, where every team plays everyone in their group twice. The group winners and runners-up move on to the ELIMINATION rounds, starting with the Sweet Sixteen, where they must play teams NOT in their OG group (2 games each). These winners move on to the Elite Eight (yes, I’m using March Madness terminology deal with it) etc etc until we are left with semi-finals, finals etc. This year was extra exciting because normally, the teams play two matches (home and away) for each leg except for the final, but this year, the Elite Eight onward were single elimination matches due to timing with COVID. Sudden death! Single Elimination! DRAMA!
K, so what happened this year?
Right! So, I think guys might have heard of this COVID situation, which happened right in the middle of the Sweet sweet Sixteen. Our boys at PSG won their qualifier playing in an empty home stadium, despite concerns the silence would throw off their game. Determined Parisian fans defied government orders and had a huge mob outside the stadium (haha simpler times). Then, sports came to a halt.
Interestingly, unlike many other leagues, Ligue 1 (the French league) chose to cancel their regular season. Did this affect the players’ conditioning, compared to say, the Bundesliga which restarted in June?? Probably.
Anyways, we come back to the Elite Eight, we play it out, PSG advances to the final! (why am I not telling you about other teams? Because i don’t have time space or energy!!) Our opponent? BAYERN MUNICH, Bundesliga champions.
Here’s some context for this final. In general, so-called “experts” kind of look down on the French league because it’s typically 1 or 2 teams that dominate. Some people call it the “Farmer’s League”. The EPL and Bundesliga + La Liga = very respect much competitive etc. A French team has only won the UCL once, in 1993….. and it happened to be Paris’s archrival, Olympique Marseille. We’re not going to talk about it. But yes, we’re bitter.
Remarkably, this year, we had two French teams in the semi-finals (Lyon and Paris- Farmer’s league my foot).
To add to this pressure, despite having probably the most talented (read: expensive) roster in professional football , Paris has been cursed unable to advance past the Round of 16 for the past several years. Qatari owners= NOT HAPPY. Coach Thomas Tuchel’s job? ON THE LINE.
On the other hand, Bayern Munich has won 5 times. Das fine. (Feels a little greedy to want another if you ask me)
Up through the final, PSG managed (for once) to play cohesively. Neymar was not hogging the glory! Mbappe was speeding his way around the pitch! (I’m assuming you might recognize these names because they’re incredibly good and incredibly hot). All of France (except Marseille) was behind them!! CLEAR EYES FULL HEARTS CAN’T LOSE.
Ok well. Bayern, the favorite, leapt to a 1-0 lead and PSG fell apart in the second half. We don’t need to get into the gritty details but they had 30% possession in the second 45 min. They could not get the ball past the midfield. Bayern wins. Mbappé cries. When Kylian Mbappé cries, we all cry.
The Upshot?
It’s pretty impressive that despite not playing for several months, and despite a team full of massive egos and an erratic style of play that hadn’t come together until post-Covid-pause, PSG was able to make it further than they ever have before. They tasted victory and they want MORE.
And, since they won the French league again, they’ll get a chance to try again in a few weeks when the UCL starts up again (now that sports have started I guess they just won’t ever stop again??) ! As I am not a sore loser, I offer my congratulations to Bayern. Whatever.
[ICI C’EST PARIS]
