The verdict of the regular phase of the Champions League, which fell this Wednesday evening, will cause cold sweats for French football. Following the draw conceded by Paris Saint-Germain against Newcastle, synonymous with eleventh place in the final, the capital club missed direct qualification. This ranking now places the Parisians on the road to AS Monaco, twenty-first after their valuable but laborious draw against Juventus (0-0). The regulations are formal: there is a one in two chance that the last two French representatives will face each other in the play-offs in February.
Paris and Monaco have a one in two chance of facing each other
The equation for this Friday’s draw is simple. The eleventh and twelfth in the ranking having to face the twenty-first and twenty-second, PSG will inherit either Monaco or Qarabag. For their part, the Monegasques will fall on Paris or the Newcastle Magpies. This scenario is worrying because Olympique de Marseille, beaten by Club Bruges, is definitively eliminated. If fate decides on a Franco-French duel, France will mathematically lose a representative even before the round of 16, repeating the scenario of PSG-Brest last season.
Such a confrontation would be unprecedented on the continental scene. If PSG and Monaco are historic rivals in Ligue 1, they have never crossed paths in the European Cup. For the princely club, however, it would not be a first against a compatriot, a painful memory of the elimination against OM in the UEFA Cup during the 1998-1999 season. Psychologically, the men from the Rock could, however, approach this duel with a certain optimism: they have already beaten the Parisians this season in the championship (1-0).
A hope of avoiding each other
Everything is not yet written. There remains a 50% chance that the two teams will avoid each other, offering PSG a double confrontation against the Azeris of Qarabag and Monaco a poster against Newcastle. This is the only scenario that would allow French football to hope to place two clubs in the European Top 16. Definitive answer in forty-eight hours, to know if accounting logic will impose a fratricidal duel or give the two teams a chance to continue their journey separately.
