Ready to shine
Silencing Neymar and Mbappe will be tough but Lennon is relishing the challenge of taking on PSG
Celtic take on PSG’s galaxy of stars tonight but teenager Karamoko Dembele will be hoping for the chance to showcase his own talents against Neymar and Co
I think they have a great chance of winning the Champions League
THE last time Celtic graced the Parc des Princes it proved a grim, white knuckle ride of a footballing experience.
Rated 28-1 outsiders on their trip to the French capital in November 2017, the multi-millionaires of Paris Saint-Germain justified those odds and then some by tearing apart Brendan Rodgers’ visiting side 7-1 after Moussa Dembele had the temerity to open the scoring early on for the Scots.
That followed a similarly emphatic 5-0 win in Glasgow for PSG two months earlier as the gap between European football’s super rich and the rest was graphically illustrated.
Tonight, as Celtic resume hostilities with the Parisian giants in a pre-season friendly, another exacting evening awaits.
The only members of the starting line-up from Celtic’s last visit who are still at Parkhead are captain Scott Brown, Olivier Ntcham, Callum McGregor, James Forrest and Tom Rogic.
In the first instance, Neil Lennon hopes that group of players will find motivation for what will be a difficult night by trying to right the wrongs of that 7-1 filleting.
But more than anything else, the Celtic boss hopes all of his players use the occasion of facing some of world football’s finest players as inspiration to get back to the group stage of the Champions League after a three-year exile.
‘I think (that 7-1 loss) might be a little bit of a motivation — that the players want to correct things or play better,’ said Lennon. ‘But PSG are a top team and they can do that to anybody — as we have seen on many occasions.
‘There’s no disgrace in it but we want to learn and to give as good a performance as we can on Tuesday night.
‘PSG are undoubtedly as good as it gets and as difficult as it gets. But every footballer should want to test themselves against the very best.
‘It’s the kind of game I enjoyed as a player, absolutely. Regardless of the time of year, it’s a fantastic game to play in.
‘Will this whet the players’ appetites for getting back into the Champions League group stage? It has to!
‘It will give them a little taste of it and so did playing against Lyon the other night.’
Of all the jewels in the PSG crown, Lennon is a particular fan of £166million forward Kylian Mbappe.
The first teenager since Pele to score in a World Cup final, as France beat Croatia 4-2 in Russia in 2018, the Celtic boss believes the 21-year-old is the real deal.
‘Mbappe is the pick of the bunch, for me,’ he said.
‘I think he is an amazing player. For someone so young he has achieved so much in the game already.
‘He’s such a dynamic player, he really hurts teams with his pace and his power. He has great finishing ability as well. He is just the complete package. He is my favourite in the PSG team.’
Lennon (right) has previously managed against the world’s costliest player, £198m Neymar, blaming the Brazilian for getting his captain Brown sent off during a 1-0 win for Barcelona at Celtic Park in October 2013.
In the aftermath of the forward’s theatrical reaction to being touched by Brown, Lennon said Neymar ‘doesn’t do himself any favours by the way he behaves at times’. But seven years on he remains a huge admirer of the 28-yearold’s talents.
‘I’m a fan of Neymar as well,’ he said. ‘He’s a great player. He’s multitalented, a brilliant player in fact. He can turn on the magic at any given time. He is pretty special. ‘He gets a bad press sometimes but he is a top talent.’ With PSG’s ferocious £409m frontline completed by Mauro Icardi, a £45m purchase from Inter Milan, Thomas Tuchel’s side has scored 16 goals in their two pre-season matches so far. Paul Le Guen’s Le Havre were beaten 9-0 at home in a match the former Rangers boss admitted could have finished 15-0. On Friday, football returned to the Parc des Princes for the first time since lockdown when Belgian second tier team WaaslandBeveren were thrashed 7-0.
And Lennon believes free-scoring PSG are looking like a team that can finally deliver to their Qatari owners the Champions League trophy that they have long coveted in return for their eye-watering financial outlay.
‘Absolutely,’ he said. ‘I think PSG have a great chance of winning the Champions League this season. They got a good draw in the last eight. They got Atalanta and they will fancy their chances of progressing.
‘The thing with PSG is that they don’t have that tradition and pedigree that all the other big European clubs have and they are desperate to break through that ceiling.
‘It took Chelsea eight years to win the Champions League (under Roman Abramovich) but they got there.
‘I saw PSG get to the quarter-finals of the Champions League a few years ago (in 2016) and I went down to watch them play Manchester City.
‘They sort of tapered off and they’ve done that a few times in the latter stages of the competition in recent years.
‘But I think PSG have got every opportunity of winning the Champions League this season.
‘It’s going to be a hell of a test for us. They have scored 16 goals in their last two games.
‘So we all know it’s a very big game and one where we will need to be very strong defensively and counter attack when we can. But defensively we are going to have to really be on it.
‘But it’s the kind of game that gets your juices really going and I know the players are really looking forward to it.
‘They have all got a couple of games under their belts now over here in France against Nice and Lyon and now we have another really good game to look forward to.’