Sunday, Monday, Tuesday… Three days to prepare your group. To wake up the bodies, sharpen the canes, impose its paw and shape a competitive team for Wednesday evening at the Geoffroy-Guichard stadium in Saint-Etienne. Mauricio Pochettino’s first challenge is certainly not the most perilous he will have to face on the PSG bench. But it can already figure prominently on the shelf reserved for the most illusory.
Officially appointed on Saturday, on the eve of the resumption of training, the successor of Thomas Tuchel has only 72 hours to put his team in place and on the legs for the resumption of the championship on Wednesday evening in Saint-Etienne. A very limited period of time which already left little room for a coach who knew his squad like the back of his hand. A delay that takes, in fact, the appearance of an impossible mission for a technician in the discovery phase.
Beyond the peculiarities of each, the state of shape of some and the seriousness of others that he will discover over the days, Mauricio Pochettino is, like all his counterparts, faced with an incompressible restart delay in get out of the winter break. “In terms of preparation, there are no miracles,” explains Laurent Bessière, performance manager at RC Lens. It seems difficult to say that they will be on top Wednesday after only three days of training. Physical preparation is a long-term job. Above all, there are about twenty weeks of competition left. If they are already ready in three days, it may be problematic for the future. “
“We can think that Paris will be ready at the end of January”
The resumption schedule was however exactly modeled on that of last season. In January 2020, after ten days of vacation, Paris had won only three days of training before resuming the path of competition. With a small nuance close since it was against Linas-Montlhéry, club of R1 (6th division) that the players of Thomas Tuchel were put back in the bath. Despite the difficulties of Saint-Etienne (14th), the opposition will be of a completely different caliber Wednesday in the Forez. The degree of complexity too.
Paris, which has favored rest over recovery, is the last L1 club to have returned to training. The Greens had been at work for four days already when Pochettino met his troops on Sunday afternoon. “At this time of year, it’s the kind of difference that counts,” assures Alexandre Marles, the former performance manager of PSG. Saint-Etienne will have a week of training behind him. It will have resumed a classic operation, with its organized work and rest times. Paris will just be in the warm-up phase. I don’t know if this will help balance the forces, but it’s probably less difficult to face PSG today than in a few weeks. “
“When you take the last one, you are necessarily the last to get back in shape, continues Marles before moderating, but the objectives of Paris are not the same as those of the others. “If he will not be in top form this week, assures Bessière, we can however think that Paris will be ready at the end of January. It is from there that he will have to cash in the three to four months of madness leading to his big goals. “
