“Why are you so angry?” a reporter asks Alguacil. And Orio’s coach, an introvert by nature, bursts out: “Can you imagine…!” The match has just concluded at the Parc des Princes. It’s Wednesday at midnight and the 2-0 score shines on the stadium sign like a stone or a relief, depending on the fans who see it. The round of 16 of the Champions League between PSG and Real has reached the halfway point in an unexpected way. La Real played better but lost in the middle of an accidental situation, in a corner, because Traoré, the man who was supposed to stick to Mbappé, had a leg pain and decided to undergo an examination in full combat.
“I can’t explain it,” Alguacil lamented. Traoré’s fragile pain threshold, unable to do his job due to a knock, irritated the coach. “That a player who had to leave the field when the team was going to receive a corner against him does not end up in the hospital… I don’t understand it! If a player leaves the team with one less it is because he has to go to the hospital. I have no doubt about it. We start from there. At the same time that that player has left the game, the entire team has left the game. If we want to compete against these rivals, we cannot give away what we have given away.”
“No rival dominated us this season like Real dominated us in the first half,” says Luis Enrique. With sportsmanship, the Asturian PSG coach recognizes that they have surpassed him. But the winner is him and the loser is the other. “They pressured us with six players,” he is surprised. “Normally in the French League they pressure us with seven. There were eight of us but we were neither fluid nor confident. We lacked the ability to find good passes. Football has this wonder because you get confused and they can mess you up. This game is super dynamic. It’s unpredictable”.
“I was more afraid of the coach than the PSG players, because he knows us very well,” warned Alguacil. His fear turned out to be unfounded.
The match was a one-on-one between Luis Enrique and Alguacil. PSG against Real Sociedad. The fans of the Parc des Princes attended confused. Sheriff prevailed. The Basque team controlled the situation in Paris. Until Hamari Traoré, in a fortuitous action in the visiting area, suffered a stomp from Mbappé. The 58th minute passed and the Malian footballer asked for the doctors’ assistance. The referee whistled a corner and sent the doctors to the sideline while Traoré, 32, underwent a quick scan. The pain caught his full attention. He did not realize that his team was one less in a critical situation: all set pieces are defended, as a rule, man to man. If one is missing, everything collapses. When Dembele takes the shot, the die is cast.
Luis Enrique: “Football is that horny”
“Real at set pieces are better than us,” says Luis Enrique with a hoarse voice in the stadium conference room, “they have great shooters and finishers. But football is that horny. Suddenly you score 1-0 from a set piece, reaching the far post with a player like Mbappé who is not a great specialist in these matters. But there is a good cross, a good shot from Marquinhos at the near post, that always means problems for the opponent, and also fortune. There were ten of them in that action because Traoré was out. “Everything has gone in our favor.”
“I have mixed feelings,” concludes Alguacil; “We had a great first half even up to the goal; We competed one by one and that is already a lot against PSG. We have had quite clear chances of scoring. But we have given them 2-0 and 1-0, where we have left the team with one less, it cannot happen in a Champions League tie against PSG. Nor can it be that after 1-0 the team gets nervous and disappears from the game. They could have killed us. It’s a difficult 2-0 but I have no doubts: if we are capable of competing like we did in the first half, why not dream of scoring the first goal in Anoeta and getting into the playoffs? With the encouragement of our public we will try to turn things around.”
Alguacil shrugged his shoulders: after all, Real could have received a rout when the 1-0 score stunned their players. “As far as possible I am happy. Because after that 1-0 and having left the game as we did, we were left with a 2-0 that, be careful! Knowing that it will be complicated with the squad they have, if we played the game we did in the first half, why not dream?