The ultimate Champions League final guide – PSG's pacy pressing vs Inter's intelligent defensive unit

New York Times

a day ago

With 188 Champions League games played, just one remains.
Tonight's final between Paris Saint-Germain and Inter Milan provides an intriguing tactical battle between two styles of play.
The omens look good for PSG as they look to lift the trophy for the first time — the previous four finals in Munich all provided a first-time winner and the only other time a French and Italian side met in the final (Marseille vs Milan, 1993 in Munich), the team from France came out on top.
Advertisement
However, Simone Inzaghi's Inter are competing in their second Champions League final in three years, and many of that 2022-23 squad remain, meaning they benefit from experience.
This is the first time the two teams have faced each other in a competitive fixture, so there is no historical data to look at, but there are clues from the run-in to the final, so allow The Athletic to unpack some key tactical themes that might emerge.
Last week, speaking at the UEFA media day ahead of the final, Luis Enrique was glowing in his assessment of PSG's pressing capabilities: 'You can see how many ball recoveries (the attackers) have. This is one of the concepts that is hardest to instil because attackers have to change their mindset. It's about working as a team. We did that last season, but we've been better this year.'
He has coached them into becoming one of Europe's most aggressive pressing sides, often comfortable going man-for-man, though they have tweaked their scheme in deeper Champions League rounds — keeping an extra defender back and leaving No 9 Ousmane Dembele to cut the pitch in half while PSG lock on down one side.
Their press was particularly excellent in the round of 16 first leg at home to Liverpool, forcing them long, and left-back Nuno Mendes shut down Mohamed Salah when he was targeted with direct balls.
The challenge now is implementing that press against one of Europe's best sides at playing over and through opponents. Manchester City head coach Pep Guardiola summarised after the 2023 Champions League final that 'they bring you up (bait the press). They found the strikers, they link really well, (they) can keep it, and after they run for the other side.'
Inter's opening goal in the quarter-final first leg away to Bayern Munich — the top-pressing team in the Champions League this season — proved that.
Inzaghi's side built up in a 2-3 shape, pushing left centre-back Alessandro Bastoni on.
When Bayern jumped, Sommer went over the press, targeting Lautaro Martinez, with Inter two-v-two against Bayern's centre-backs.
Lautaro, only 5ft 8in (176cm) tall, beats Kim Min-jae in the air and flicks it on to Marcus Thuram. Immediately, he arcs a run in support as they play a one-two.
The release pass to wing-back Carlos Augusto is not quite on — because he ran so early, he is offside — so Lautaro finds the advancing centre-back Bastoni.
Bastoni then plays forward to Augusto, with both Inter wing-backs on the last line (Matteo Darmian is just in shot on the near side).
The rest of the move has to be appreciated in video form, with Augusto's early, low cross trying to find a tap-in for Thuram. It ends up a little more behind him than he wants, and the France international reacts excellently to backheel it into Lautaro's path. He picks out the top-right corner with an outside-of-the-boot finish.
Full-backs — or wing-backs — very rarely tend to be match-winners, but that could easily be the case in this final.
Inter's 3-5-2 in possession is built on the attacking output of Federico Dimarco and Denzel Dumfries, with the latter involved in five of Inter's six goals (two goals, three assists) in the semi-final over Barcelona.
Collectively, Inter have scored 10 times from crosses this Champions League season, the most in the competition. They showed their wide threat inside a minute of the semi-final when they baited the Barcelona press, played long to Thuram, and Nicolo Barella released Dumfries.
After his first cross was cleared — with Dimarco attacking the back post — he crossed low for Thuram to backheel in.
It's a dream start for Inter.
Marcus Thuram gives the visitors the lead after just 30 seconds with a wonderful improvised finish.
The Estadi Olimpic Lluis Companys is stunned.#UCL
🎥 @footballontnt pic.twitter.com/qFhgjymGW0
— The Athletic | Football (@TheAthleticFC) April 30, 2025
PSG's full-backs are equally fundamental to their style. Right-back Achraf Hakimi is rarely right or back in the team, often taking up aggressive positions in the half-space in attack, as PSG's 4-3-3 really builds up as a 3-2-5. He provides plenty of underlapping runs to support and combine with the winger — either Desire Doue or Khvicha Kvaratskhelia — and a real box-crashing threat too.
On the left, Nuno Mendes tucks in plenty to cover for Hakimi, often making a back three. In moments of settled possession, though, he will push forward too to overload the last line. Hakimi (eight) and Mendes (five) are second and fourth for goal involvements in the PSG squad this European term, and they either scored or assisted eight of their 19 knockout round goals.
They combined for PSG's second in the quarter-final return leg away to Aston Villa, breaking from deep with Hakimi making the third-man run when Kvaratskhelia set a pass back to Joao Neves.
PSG were four-versus-two, with Mendes running — offside — straight through the centre and Dembele having pulled wide. Hakimi passed wide to Dembele, who dribbled.
Hakimi's underlap took the defender with him…
… and Dembele passed across to Mendes, who controlled with his first touch and curled past Emi Martinez, in off the post, with his second.
Many neutrals might give PSG the edge in Saturday's final, given the blistering pace and intelligent interchange of their fluid attack. However, if there were one team in European football that you would back to stop them, it would be Inter.
Inter's defensive unit has been incredible in the Champions League this season, conceding just one open-play goal in their opening 10 games. Granted, six goals conceded across two semi-final legs against Barcelona will give Luis Enrique confidence that he can inflict similar punishment on Inzaghi, but Inter are comfortable in their disciplined 5-3-2 block that can frustrate teams for long periods.
Inter are not set up to be gung-ho in their pressing, but will shuffle across from left to right and block central spaces — forcing the opposition to circulate possession and do their best to find gaps in their structure.
While PSG are not the most aerially dominant in attack, they could learn from Inter's semi-final clash with Barcelona — where crosses were a thorn in the side of the Nerazzurri. Running back the tape, Inter failed to deal with back-post crosses specifically, with Barcelona scoring three goals that way.
Advertisement
Given Inter's back-five defensive line, disruption can come from second-line runners or aggressive full-back position from the opposition (as was the case with Dani Olmo and Eric Garcia's finishes below), meaning that late runs from PSG's Hakimi, Nuno Mendes, or Fabian Ruiz could be crucial in unlocking Inter's defence.
Crucially, Inter are not accustomed to chasing the game.
Such defensive discipline and intelligent street-smarts have meant that Inzaghi's side have trailed for just 16 minutes across the whole Champions League campaign — just one per cent of their total time on the pitch.
Considering they have played against Arsenal, Manchester City, Bayer Leverkusen, Barcelona and Bayern Munich, you can understand why caution is being encouraged when suggesting that PSG are the overwhelming favourites in Munich.
When the margins are so tight between two elite sides, moments from set pieces could be integral in swinging the outcome of this final.
Inter have had plenty of success from set-piece situations on the domestic stage this season, with 18 set-piece goals scored being comfortably the highest in Serie A. Meanwhile, goals from corners have been particularly lucrative for Inzaghi's side in the Champions League, with 9.5 goals per 100 corners being the highest rate of any team in the competition this season.
Goals from Benjamin Pavard and Dumfries have been crucial in Inter's knockout phase clashes with Bayern Munich and Barcelona, with the Nerazzurri boasting seven different goalscorers from corner routines across league and European competition this season.
Much of that threat stems from the delivery. While Dimarco can whip in an excellent cross from the left, Inter's best set-piece taker is undoubtedly Hakan Calhanoglu, with the Turkey international well placed to take corners from both sides of the pitch.
Advertisement
That explains Inter's asymmetry in corner style, where the majority of deliveries are from Calhanoglu's outswingers from the right — compared with a more equitable share between Dimarco and Calhanoglu from the left, varying the approach between inswinging and outswinging crosses. Irrespective of the taker, Inter's delivery is often placed perfectly towards the central zones — close to the penalty spot — for team-mates to attack.
The battling approach from Inzaghi's side is borne out in the numbers, with a 54 per cent duel success rate in Europe this season — better than any other side since the start of the competition.
Winning first contact and responding to second balls might not sound attractive, but such an agricultural part of the game could be crucial in deciding where the trophy ends up by the end of Saturday evening.
For this answer, we can turn to The Athletic's match prediction model.
This uses per-shot expected goals to create an attacking and defensive rating for each team, before employing a data model to simulate upcoming games.
Here, the model is giving the edge to Luis Enrique's side, with PSG having a 53 per cent chance of victory (excluding penalties) compared with Inter's 27 per cent. If pushed for more detail, The Athletic's model predicts that a 2-1 PSG victory will be the most likely scoreline on the night.
That would be a logical projection of events on Saturday evening in Munich — but as we know, football does not conform to logic. In a straight shootout at the highest level of European competition, all rules often go out of the window.
Leave your predictions in the comments below.
Where to watch the final: UK — TNT Sports 1 and Discovery+, 6pm BST; U.S. — CBS and Paramount+, 1.30pm ET
(Illustration: Eamonn Dalton / The Athletic; Thibaud MORITZ / AFP, David Ramos, Jeroen van den Berg/Soccrates, Mattia Ozbot – Inter/Inter /Getty Images)