Ousmane Demb\u00e9l\u00e9 grins when he says that, if he does not press, he will be benched by Luis Enrique. The Ballon d\u2019Or winner does not do his defensive work under duress. Like the rest of his teammates, he seems to derive enjoyment from a part of the game that was once seen as unnatural. Attackers would attack and defenders would defend; simple rules for a simple game. But demands have changed.<\/p>\n
The forward line of Kylian Mbapp\u00e9, Lionel Messi and Neymar was a mouthwatering prospect but they failed to take Paris Saint\u2011Germain close to a Champions League<\/a> title and there was a lack of joy in their work. All attack and no defend made PSG a dull watch. There was a lesson in their failure: that football had changed and matches could not be won by the sheer weight of their attacking talent.<\/p>\n Luis Enrique tried to teach Mbapp\u00e9 that lesson in his final season at the club. In a documentary on the manager\u2019s first year at PSG, there was a scene in which Mbapp\u00e9 was sat down like a naughty schoolboy and forced to watch his own defensive shortcomings during the Champions League quarter-final against Barcelona. Luis Enrique made his demands very clear: \u201cI read that you like Michael Jordan,\u201d he said. \u201cMichael Jordan grabbed his teammates by the balls and defended like a son of a bitch. You think you have to score goals for us. Of course, you\u2019re a phenomenon, a world-class player, no doubt, but that doesn\u2019t matter to me that much. Being a leader is, when you can\u2019t help us with goals, you help us defensively. If you set the example by going to press, you know what we have? A fucking team.\u201d<\/p>\n Mbapp\u00e9 has since admitted that he was \u201chalf-thinking about Madrid at that point\u201d and that he \u201cdidn\u2019t make the most of Luis Enrique\u201d. The France captain never bought into the overarching philosophy. He thought that defending would stymie his attacking potential and he did not want to give up the freedom he had been granted by his former managers for the sake of the collective.<\/p>\n The players who now make up PSG\u2019s forward line \u2013 Demb\u00e9l\u00e9, Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, D\u00e9sir\u00e9 Dou\u00e9 and Bradley Barcola \u2013 have no such qualms. In Europe\u2019s top five leagues, no player has made more presses per 90 minutes than Dou\u00e9. Kvaratskhelia also features in the top five. The footage of Demb\u00e9l\u00e9 waiting to pounce<\/a> on Yann Sommer\u2019s goal-kick during last season\u2019s Champions League final is one of the prevailing images of PSG\u2019s maiden triumph. Fail to comply and you\u2019re on the bench; having four world-class options for three places in the team ensures that threat is not a hollow one.<\/p>\n But the players themselves, notably Demb\u00e9l\u00e9, also drive the standards. \u201cAbove all, we have to play for Paris Saint-Germain<\/a> to win matches because, if we play alone on the pitch, that won\u2019t work. Last year, we put the club above everything else, before thinking about ourselves. We need to rediscover that. We have to play for the club first and foremost before thinking about ourselves,\u201d he said in February. Performances in the Champions League since suggest he has been heard by his teammates.<\/p>\n PSG rank second in ball recoveries in this season\u2019s competition, behind Atl\u00e9tico Madrid. Last season, they topped this metric \u2013 and by some distance. But as they showed emphatically against Bayern Munich last week, their defensive diligence does not come at the detriment of spectacle, flair, entertainment or efficiency.<\/p>\n D\u00e9sir\u00e9 Dou\u00e9 and Khvicha Kvaratskhelia celebrate during PSG\u2019s 5-4 win against Bayern Munich. Photograph: Lionel Hahn\/Getty Images<\/p>\n Kvaratskhelia is proof of that. The Georgian has 10 goals and five assists in the Champions League \u2013 a record for a PSG player in a single campaign \u2013 and has also become only the fourth player to score or assist in six consecutive knockout games in the tournament. Demb\u00e9l\u00e9 did the same last season.<\/p>\n Of course, PSG are not alone in adopting a super-aggressive high-press approach, and in recent days, much attention has been paid to the conditions that allow them to implement it better than others \u2013 notably clubs north of the English Channel.<\/p>\n