Tonight, Illia Zabarnyi will play at home. Ukraine faces the French team at the Parc des Princes with the firm intention of taking their revenge (beaten 2-0 in the first leg) and getting back to level with the Blues in the standings of Group D of the 2026 World Cup qualifiers. Heckled in the first leg in Poland, Zabarnyi will have the advantage this evening of knowing well a pitch that he walks on every week with the Paris Saint-Germain jersey. A small detail to allow him to finally reverse the trend? No one knows, but what is certain is that the former Bournemouth resident is expected around the corner.
Arriving this summer in Paris in exchange for €63 million, Zabarnyi is struggling to justify his status as the most expensive recruit in the last Ile-de-France transfer window. Catastrophic during his last appearance in the Champions League against Bayer Leverkusen and the only negative point of the magical evening of PSG winning 7 goals to 2 (two penalties caused, a red card), the Ukrainian was in difficulty again last weekend against Olympique Lyonnais (3-2). In front of the microphones, the future opponent of the Blues briefly spoke about his debut after the match won at the last minute against Nice (1-0). “I feel good, I love this club, the fans, the team, the staff. Everyone is trying to help me. My mission is to do my best for the team”.
Paris remains patient
Recruited with the objective of making him Marquinhos’ successor, Zabarnyi still appears too slow on the pitch and cannot manage the profiles of fast players. His way of defending like a wrestler, when he sends an opponent trying to overwhelm him by pushing with both hands, did not find favorable echoes among the referees, but it remains an element appreciated by observers. “He’s a very, very good defender. If today he is at PSG and he is a starter for the selection, it is because he is a good defender. I don’t know him personally, but from what I’ve seen of him, he’s a good defender. He’s a defender with a lot of aggression and what’s more, he’s young so he’ll still progress.”declared Dayot Upamecano recently.
And if one of the best defenders in world football today says it, maybe you should listen to him. One thing is certain: in Paris, we don’t worry. In today’s edition, The Parisian explains that the Red and Blue are not surprised by Zabarnyi’s difficulties. “His case does not worry the PSG staff who expected to see him go through this delicate period of adaptation where he not only has to manage a new environment, another language and instructions very different from those he managed to assimilate quickly in the Premier League”we can read in the daily newspaper. So Zabarnyi still has credit!
