This is the Ligue 1 information from this morning of September 4. A few hours before the clash counting for the third day of the championship between Paris Saint-Germain and AS Monaco, the capital club has just revealed the group of 21 players selected by Luis Enrique. Still suspended following his red card received during the Champions Trophy against Lens (0-1), Nuno Mendes is logically absent. On the other hand, no Lucas Digne. A notable absence, because the 33-year-old French full-back is not injured. According to the first feedback from the Red and Blue, it is a sporting choice by Luis Enrique.
A sporting choice from Luis Enrique
A hard blow for the former Aston Villa resident who had nevertheless been one of the players chosen yesterday by PSG for its media day. The defender also showed his joy at having returned ten years later to a transformed club. “Luis Enrique didn’t need to talk too much to convince me. When PSG comes to pick you up, it’s the biggest club in the world, there’s no need to think. I knew what I wanted. At the tactical level, data, medical, I can’t even mention everything. Everything is put in place so that the players are at their best. Even in the training mentality, you always have to win, that’s how it is in the biggest club in the world. The comparison with the PSG of Zlatan and Cavani? Wow, all locker rooms are different. This locker room is a locker room that has won, that lives very well and you can feel it. It’s nice to be part of it. »
Digne is perhaps very happy to return to Paris, but clearly, he does not convince his coach who was nevertheless pleased yesterday with the summer recruits. “The assessment that I can make is that we had an exceptional transfer window, for me, without a doubt. I think the president, the management with Luis Campos have done an incredible job. I am very happy. (…) We are happy to start the season with this number of players. I can say that I am happy, afterward you have to know that the adaptation time, the level that they will give to the team. When we started the second year, everyone had doubts about the recruits. But afterwards, the result arrived and we could see the level they gave. We bought the players we wanted. »
An understudy who becomes a replacement for the replacement
Today, Lucas Digne must undoubtedly hope that it is only an adaptation that is dragging and not a problem of level. Because for several weeks now, his transfer to PSG has caused a lot of ink to flow. Before returning to France, his poor performance in the World Cup semi-final against Spain (guilty of the penalty on Lamine Yamal which opened the score for La Roja) had revealed some doubts about the 33-year-old’s ability to remain competitive at the highest level. Since then, the doubts have not been dispelled. Replacing against Aston Villa, Digne was unable to take advantage of Nuno Mendes’ three-match suspension to gain playing time. Replacing at Rennes (0 minutes) as well as at Lille (18th minutes), the full-back is therefore not even in the squad for tonight’s match.
Recruited to be Mendes’ understudy, Lucas Digne suffered a severe downgrade since after having played Lucas Hernandez in Brittany, Luis Enrique preferred to align his Swiss army knife, Warren Zaire-Emery, on the left flank of the defense against the Mastiffs and perhaps again this evening against the ASM. “He needs to wake up. That he came by accepting this role of number 2, okay, but he is not on vacation or in early retirement. We are not saying that this is the case, but we will not accept that. He has to fight and try to be better than Nuno because Nuno won’t play every match. He has to fight, it’s also part of his adaptation phase”indicated a source within PSG recently in the press. Today, the message is more relevant than ever, even if the main person concerned assured the media yesterday that he was not worried. “No, at all. It’s an adaptation, it requires a lot of things. If I had to worry after three games, it would still be sad. »
