PLAYER RATINGS | PSG 2-0 Real Sociedad: Mbappé and Barcola seal first-leg win

The tired axiom that Paris Saint-Germain’s season only ever really starts in February does, admittedly, have some truth to it. For all their domestic dominance (although the story this season has been more nuanced than their 11-point lead at the top suggests) overcoming the mental block of the Champions League knockout stages was always going to be Luis Enrique’s first real test in charge.

For most of tonight’s last 16 first leg against Real Sociedad, it looked as though their continental stage fright would get the better of them again. The hosts were decidedly not up to the task in the opening exchanges, with the Basques successfully pressing their opponents off their game. Luis Enrique’s men looked particularly vulnerable on their left flank, with Lucas Beraldo – the winter signing from Brazil thrown into the deep end for his first Champions League game – struggling to stave off an electric Takefusa Kubo.

PSG did manage to break out of their own half on the counter, but neither Mbappé nor Dembélé could trouble Remiro. The best chances came the visitors’ way, though – André Silva’s header going narrowly wide before Mikel Merino struck the bar with a long-range effort.

That pattern of play would subsist at the start of the second half – until, against the run of play, the hosts broke the deadlock on the hour mark. With Marquinhos nodding on Dembélé’s corner to the back post, Mbappé was on hand to finish from close range, for his fourth goal in Europe this season. Bradley Barcola would double the lead twenty minutes from time, finishing off a sweeping counter-attack with a devastating solo effort from the left wing.

It was fitting that the summer signing – with his last contribution – would be the one to pull PSG clear. It