Paris Saint-Germain’s path towards defending their Champions League crown will be laid out on Thursday when the draw for the 36-team league phase of Europe’s elite club competition takes place in Monaco.
PSG’s thrilling triumph in last season’s final in Munich, when they inflicted a 5-0 hammering on Inter Milan to win the trophy for the first time, came at the end of the first edition of the Champions League under the competition’s new format.
The group stage, in place for more than 20 years, was consigned to history and replaced by a 36-team competition in which every club was pooled together into one giant league and played eight games against eight different opponents.
PSG, as it turns out, finished an unremarkable 15th in the league phase but then won on penalties in the last 16 against Liverpool, who had come first.
Luis Enrique’s side did not look back after that, becoming just the second French winners of the trophy, following Marseille in 1993.
Now their aim is to retain it – something only Real Madrid have managed in the last 35 years.