PSG: Barcola, dream bigger in Paris… before the Blues and Euro 2024?

How we meet again... Five days after its comeback in Barcelona (1-4) on Tuesday, in the quarter-final second leg of the Champions League, Bradley Barcola's PSG challenges the team in form of the moment, Lyon, on the 30th day of Ligue 1. A shock and a “preview” of the Coupe de France final which will pit the two teams against each other on May 25, in Lille. It will obviously also be a special poster for the young (21 year old) Barcola, raised at OL and who had also been booed by his former public, at Groupama Stadium, for his first match in Rouge et Bleu.

Which Barcola arrived in Paris on tiptoe, he who we imagined confined to a role of second knife in the shadow of Kylian Mbappé and Ousmane Dembélé. This was also how the Lyon native started the season. A fan of turnover, Luis Enrique, quickly won over by the boy's qualities, nevertheless found him a place in the 11 here and there in L1. In the Champions League, it was harder: bench against Dortmund (2-0), 33 minutes at Newcastle (4-1), re-bench against Milan (3-0) and one minute at San Siro (2- 1). And there was PSG-Newcastle (1-1). Entering in the 62nd minute, Barcola had multiplied the differences… and the failures. The criticisms were rife. Hard. Acerbic.

“Lucho” already saw further. “I remember that after Newcastle he suffered a lot of criticism, unfair and very far from reality. He played high-level matches but that's not why there are only positives. He must continue to work. He’s a player who works every day, it’s very good and it will bear fruit,” underlines Luis Enrique, who is also “delighted that the young players we recruited are playing at this level, it was the objective". And added: “Bradley represented a gamble from sports management and staff. He is a young player, a Frenchman, a player who has high level technical and physical potential. Taking this step and joining a team like PSG is not easy for any player.” The number 21 of Paris Saint-Germain has obviously adapted very well to it, that's quite clear.

From Newcastle, Barcola was a permanent fixture in the mind of the 53-year-old Spanish technician, who was not for nothing in his coming to Paris according to various sources. His speed, his ability to eliminate, his connection with Mbappé and Dembélé make him a first choice in his eyes. We saw why again last Tuesday, at the Montjuïc Olympic stadium. The Espoirs international dynamited the Catalan defense in the first period, causing the expulsion of Ronald Araujo and offering the first Parisian goal of the match to “Dembouz”. "The keys ? Put on the intensity that we didn't put on on the way out. And even in the minds, we were better, so there was everything to win”, savored Jorge Mendes' colt, noting that there is “really a big collective. We all work together offensively and defensively. And when we play like that, I think we are unstoppable,” he added.

The kind of performance that makes you say that Barcola has grown up. And above all, he made the right choice by deciding to join Paris last summer, for €50 million, after only six good months with his training club, OL. “I know I made a very good choice in coming here,” he confides. I had no doubts about my choice. I'm really very happy. I am very proud to be Parisian today and I hope that we will go as far as possible.” As for the championship, the mass has already been said. The die is cast for the Coupe de France at the end of May. And as for the “Champions”, an appointment has been made with Dortmund on May 1 and 7 in the semi-finals. Before Real or Bayern?

However, these are not the only dates marked in red on his calendar. There is undoubtedly also May 16, the day when Didier Deschamps will unveil his list for Euro 2024 (June 14-July 14). In March, the coach had already thought about it… before giving up. “He is one of the players we follow. He's been showing some great things lately. He needs to confirm and assert himself, more in content. But he is a player with great potential,” indicated “DD”, who preferred Moussa Diaby to compensate for the absence of Kingsley Coman. “It seemed more logical to me to recall Moussa. But I don’t know what will happen between now and May,” he said.

As for the French offensive sector at the Euro, Kylian Mbappé, Ousmane Dembélé, Antoine Griezmann, Olivier Giroud, Marcus Thuram and Randal Kolo Muani leave with the favor of the forecasts. And there are the Kingsley Coman and Christopher Nkunku cases. The first has “several weeks” away from the field after a thigh injury with Bayern, while the second, who has not seen Clairefontaine since 2022, just before the World Cup, has a series of problems and only comes to resume training with Chelsea. If Deschamps has to do without them, we imagine that the choice would fall on Moussa Diaby or Bradley Barcola. "Blues ? If it has to happen, it will happen,” said, in February, the number 29 of PSG, who would be summoned by Thierry Henry for the Olympics if he missed the Euro 2024 train.

Also read “PSG has the possibility of winning everything”: Luis Enrique (very) ambitious for the end of the season

To convince Deschamps, Barcola still has a little less than a month until the list is announced. By then, PSG will have played four Ligue 1 matches (Lyon, Lorient, Le Havre, Nice) and the C1 semi-final against Dortmund. If he continues his Barcelona momentum, the former Gone would give himself every chance, he who has three goals and seven assists in Parisian colors (32 matches) since last summer.

If he is “not really amazed” by the performances of the person concerned, it is because Pierre Sage “already appreciated a lot of things about him when he played with the reserves” of OL. Referring to his “intelligence in the way he organizes his game in relation to his partner”, the Lyon coach notes that Barcola “was able to put his qualities at the service of a competitive team. I hope for him that he will be rewarded at the end of the season… except on a certain date that we all know.” This is about the final of the Coupe de France on May 25.

Not stingy with compliments for his former teammate, Maxence Caqueret, he first thinks of PSG-OL this Sunday before the final. “Surprised by his level? No way. He is a player who has enormous talent and who knows what he wants. I'm not surprised at all but very happy for him because he's a great guy, I'm still in contact with him. I'm happy that he can establish himself in a big club like that, that he performs. Afterwards, I hope that he will be a little less efficient this weekend and that we can win the match,” smiled the Gones midfielder to the press, remembering a player who “made the unanimity straight away (in the locker room) even if he had little or no playing time. He knew how to be patient and that is to his credit.”

And to continue, on Bradley Barcola's performance against Barça last Tuesday: “Where he was strong was in the percussion, something he already had here and which he had to perfect. He's a pretty complete player for a winger. I'm happy for him that he can develop and I think he still has room to improve to become an even better player. It promises. Bradley Barcola knows what he has to do to dream bigger.