Before Paris St-Germain’s Champions League match at Barcelona last month, French superstar Kylian Mbappe looked around the Nou Camp before turning to new manager Mauricio Pochettino and asking: “Hey coach, how many times have you won here?”
“Just once,” the former Tottenham manager replied. “With Espanyol.”
“Don’t worry, boss,” Mbappe said in perfect Spanish, “tonight we’ll make it two”.
After the last-16 first-leg game – in which Mbappe scored a stunning hat-trick in a 4-1 win – the pair spoke again. “I told you boss,” said the 22-year-old. “Now you’ve won twice.”
That night, a select few of us were in the stadium to witness to what looked very much like the systematic dismantling of the old order and its replacement by the new.
Football is frequently about a collection of unforgettable, individual images and the freeze frame left imprinted on my brain is that of the once…