{"id":492666,"date":"2026-03-24T13:48:10","date_gmt":"2026-03-24T13:48:10","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/492666\/"},"modified":"2026-03-24T13:48:10","modified_gmt":"2026-03-24T13:48:10","slug":"psg-request-to-move-match-before-liverpool-champions-league-tie-2","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/492666\/","title":{"rendered":"PSG request to move match before Liverpool Champions League tie"},"content":{"rendered":"<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Paris St-Germain have asked to postpone their Ligue 1 game against title rivals Lens which is sandwiched between the two legs of their Champions League quarter-final against <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/sport\/football\/teams\/liverpool\" class=\"ssrcss-18834jl-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Liverpool<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">PSG are scheduled to visit Lens in a top-of-the-table encounter on Saturday, 11 April &#8211; three days after hosting Arne Slot&#8217;s side and three days before the second leg at Anfield.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\"><a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/sport\/football\/teams\/liverpool\" class=\"ssrcss-18834jl-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Liverpool<\/a> are set to host <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/sport\/football\/teams\/fulham\" class=\"ssrcss-18834jl-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Fulham<\/a> in the Premier League on 11 April.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">In response to PSG&#8217;s request to France&#8217;s Ligue de Football Professionel (LFP), Lens &#8211; who are chasing a first league title since 1998 &#8211; issued a statement saying they are strongly against the &#8220;troubling sentiment&#8221; if the fixture is moved to a later date.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Lens added that their domestic league risks being &#8220;gradually relegated to the status of an adjustment variable at the whim of the European imperatives of some&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;Beyond this specific case, the question raised is a more fundamental one: that of the respect due to the competition itself,&#8221; a club statement said. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">&#8220;For one is entitled to wonder when, on its own soil, the league sometimes seems to be relegated to second place behind other ambitions, however legitimate they may be.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">A spokesperson for PSG told BBC Sport that &#8220;this type of rescheduling has been carried out regularly by the LFP in the past for the benefit of French clubs&#8221; and &#8220;in no way calls the league into question&#8221;.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">They added that &#8220;the performances of French clubs competing on the European stage benefit French football as whole, with France currently occupying 6th place in the Uefa coefficient rankings for the 2025-26 season.&#8221;<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Second-placed Lens currently trail leaders PSG by one point &#8211; and Lens head coach Pierre Sage said after Sunday&#8217;s 5-1 win over Angers that his side did not agree with a postponement. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">In PSG&#8217;s previous Champions League tie against <a href=\"https:\/\/www.bbc.com\/sport\/football\/teams\/chelsea\" class=\"ssrcss-18834jl-InlineLink e1kn3p7n0\" rel=\"nofollow noopener\" target=\"_blank\">Chelsea<\/a>, Luis Enrique&#8217;s side had the weekend off in between the two legs because their game against Nantes was postponed after a similar request to help them prepare as effectively as possible. The European champions won 8-2 on aggregate.<\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">Ultimately, the final call is with the LFP, and their stance is they will look to assist French clubs that are playing in Europe. <\/p>\n<p class=\"ssrcss-1q0x1qg-Paragraph e1jhz7w10\">The LFP also confirmed Strasbourg have asked for their league game at Brest on that same weekend to be postponed as it comes in between their Conference League games against Mainz.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"Paris St-Germain have asked to postpone their Ligue 1 game against title rivals Lens which is sandwiched between&hellip;\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":492469,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[9],"tags":[59,101,56,54,55],"class_list":{"0":"post-492666","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-sports","8":"tag-gb","9":"tag-sports","10":"tag-uk","11":"tag-united-kingdom","12":"tag-unitedkingdom"},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/492666","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=492666"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/492666\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/492469"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=492666"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=492666"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/uk\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=492666"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}