2 positives and 4 negatives from PSG’s disappointing reversal to Rennes

PSG’s inconsistent form continued as they suffered an embarrassing reverse to Ligue 1 side Rennes, who beat them 3-1 last night at the Roazhon Park.

Musa Al-Taamari, Esteban LePaul and Breel Embolo scored for the home side, who despite often falling under PSG pressure managed to carve the Parisians upon on three occasions. Ousmane Dembélé’s goal for PSG eventually proved meaningless.

Here are four things PSG fans will be worried about after last night’s debacle, and two silver linings that will potentially cheer them up ahead of next week’s crucial Champions League clash at Monaco.

Positives and negatives from PSG’s disappointing defeat to Rennes

Negative: More inconsistency ahead of crucial Champions League tie

In a season in which PSG have struggled to ever really string together a run of intimidating form, this is another irritating and unnecessary setback, especially directly after last week’s emphatic win against Marseille, which felt like a corner being turned. PSG have struggled at Roazhon Park before, but Rennes’ poor recent form felt like a perfect opportunity to lay down a statement win. Instead, this game only served as further proof of the underlying softness that has plagued PSG’s entire season so far.

Negative: Starting attack was toothless once attack, and key players didn’t even get rested

Another big issue for the Parisians is how many chances they missed. Once again, they looked toothless in attack – and this time, it was their starting forwards who were to blame, with Desiré Doué missing a one-on-one in the first half, and Khvicha Kvaratskhelia somehow miskicking a simple chance minutes later. Even more annoyingly for Luis Enrique, these players starting means that they didn’t even get a night’s rest ahead of Tuesday’s Champions League trip to Monaco.

Negative: Defending set pieces is starting to become a real issue, and PSG aren’t scoring from them either.

Rennes’ second goal last night came from a corner, which emphasises concerns that PSG fans have had all season about the way that their side defends set pieces: The Parisians are quite a short side, and they seem to consistently struggle at set pieces, both defensively and attacking them, with their lack of height proving a persistent issue in aerial battles. They will have to look to solidify this part of their game going forwards, with the loss of Gianluigi Donnarumma last summer a key one in this aspect.

Negative: It’s still close at the top in Ligue Un, with a league title far from assured at this stage.

This result could be far more easily forgiven were PSG cruising at the top of the table, but that is far from being the case. Instead, second place Lens can return to the top of the table tonight, if they manage to win against PSG’s city rivals Paris FC. PSG will be immensely frustrated to have let Lens back into the title race, and will hope that their local rivals can do them a big favour and force Lens into dropping points. The clash between Lens and PSG on the 12th of April is looking more and more interesting by the day, as the club from Calais just seem to keep on winning.

Positive: Dro Fernandez making another neat cameo appearance.

One positive for PSG on this disappointing evening was the substitute introduction of young Dro Fernandez, making a second cameo off the bench after his January move from Barcelona. Luis Enrique has wasted no time in embedding the youngster into the first team, which will delight PSG fans, and the youngster once again looked sharp off the bench last night, even though he failed to turn the game around.

Positive: PSG still look fluid going forwards and are creating a lot of chances.

PSG fans will also take solace in the fact that their attack still looks fluid and dynamic, and manages to constantly create chances: better for a side to miss easy chances than to not create them at all. Enrique will hope that his forwards have their shooting boots on next Tuesday in the Champions League, because if they create as many opportunities as they did last night, they might just blow Monaco away.