Barcelona have been warned Hansi Flick’s tactics could prevent them from winning the Champions League after they were beaten by holders PSG.
Barca kick-started their Champions League campaign with a 2-1 win over Newcastle United but lost to PSG by the same scoreline on Wednesday night.
Flick’s side led through Ferran Torres’s well-worked opener but teenage star Senny Mayulu equalised for the Champions League holders before half-time.
The game looked set to end all square but PSG took advantage of Barcelona’s incredibly high line late on to snatch a winner through Goncalo Ramos.
Luis Enrique’s PSG are one of six teams to have taken maximum points from their first two games of this year’s Champions League.
The French champions will be particularly buoyed by their victory in Spain given they were without several key players, including Khvicha Kvaratskhelia, Marquinhos and Ballon d’Or winner Ousmane Dembele.
Barcelona will be disappointed not to have taken advantage of PSG’s depleted squad and Steve McManaman described the defeat as ‘self-inflicted’.
‘It’s self-inflicted from Barcelona,’ the former Liverpool, Real Madrid and Manchester City winger said on TNT Sports.
‘Why on earth in the last minute of normal time are you playing that high on the halfway line? It baffles me.
‘If they don’t sort this out they won’t win this competition because you cannot play like this. It’s an awful goal to concede at any level.
‘It’s so late on in the game and they’re taking those chances. Look how high they are, look at the disorganisation.’
Barcelona reached the semi-finals of the Champions League last season before an agonising defeat to eventual runners-up Inter Milan.
Flick guided Barca to the La Liga title last year and the club are currently top of the domestic table with 19 points from seven games.
Speaking after this evening’s defeat, Barcelona boss Flick said: ‘Paris has high quality and speed. They had fresh legs and they increased the level of their team, they deserved to win.
‘We’ve had a lot of matches in the last few weeks, so we’ll meet and learn about these things on Friday. We will all speak about this game what we have to do better.
‘I am 100% sure that we could play like Paris, but it’s about 90 minutes. The whole team has to work, the whole team has to defend, the whole team has to use the spaces, the whole team has to be involved in the ball possession.
‘You can see in Paris that everybody wanted the ball, knew how to use the spaces, knew how to play one-on-one. We have to learn this.
‘At half-time, we showed the defence and the attack three or four things each, but you could see that we were tired.
‘If we had done everything correctly, I think we would have won the match, but it’s clear that we didn’t do so.
‘We lost today, and I don’t like that. We have to accept this defeat and admit that Paris are so good. Football is like this.
‘We are disappointed, the fans are disappointed. We have to accept that we were beaten, but work on getting better.’
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