Latest news with #Doué
Yahoo
a day ago
- Business
- Yahoo
Arsenal Boss Mikel Arteta Rejected Chance to Pursue PSG Ace Who Starred in Champions League Win
Désiré Doué has been turning heads in recent months with standout performances against Liverpool and Aston Villa, capped off by a stunning brace in the UEFA Champions League final against Inter Milan. The young Frenchman played a pivotal role in PSG's shootout win over Liverpool, calmly converting the decisive penalty to send the English side packing. He followed that up in the next round by scoring a brilliant equalizer against Aston Villa in the first leg, helping PSG take control of the tie with a 3-1 victory. Advertisement With such poise in high-stakes moments, it's no surprise top European clubs are starting to take notice. And on the biggest stage of all, Doué delivered again—scoring twice in the Champions League final to help PSG lift the trophy. Yet, there was one club that had a chance to make a serious move for Doué last summer but ultimately passed. Arsenal missed out on PSG standout last summerAccording to Fichajes, Arsenal manager Mikel Arteta passed on the chance to sign the PSG ace that the club had been tracking for £30 million last year. His reasoning was simple during a meeting with the club's directors: 'We already have Martinelli,' he said. Doué also had other suitors last summer with Bayern Munich being one team keen on him. Nonetheless, the Frenchman decided to stay in France and leave Stade Rennais for PSG and after this weekend's performance against Inter Milan the decision proved to be the right one.
Irish Examiner
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Irish Examiner
Désiré Doué joins the global A-list to lead PSG's coronation as kings of Europe
The third great Moment of Doué was beautiful for its simplicity, 63 minutes into this game and with Paris Saint-Germain (PSG) 2-0 up. As Désiré Doué glided in on goal, all alone suddenly in a wide open patch of green, he was found by a deliciously weighted through pass from Vitinha. From there Doué allowed the ball to run across him as the retreating Inter defenders closed at his back, a perfect little screenshot of time, space, angles, ground speed allowing him to open his right instep and shoot with the path of the pass, wrong-footing Yann Sommer and easing the ball into the far corner. The celebration, and indeed the game itself to that point, felt coronational. Doué took off his shirt, saw it placed on the corner flag and stood in clean-cut gladiatorial pose in front of the Paris supporters, before slightly sheepishly – this is also very Doué-like – going to retrieve his shirt and accept his yellow card. By then the game was gone, as was Doué shortly after, replaced by Bradley Barcola. And really it was his opening 20 minutes that decided this Champions League final. Doué is a very distinct kind of attacking tyro, with a martial artist's precision in his close-quarter fast-twitch movements, always just enough of a feint and a snap of the heels, always purposeful, never gratuitous. Watching him on nights such as this, it is as though somebody has taken Neymar and boiled him for eight hours until all the waffle and frippery have disappeared, then sent him on to the pitch crisp and starched and purified. This is a Neymar without the madness, the weight, the excess appetite, a post-therapy Neymar. Read More Carnival atmosphere in Paris after Champions League success Plus, of course, Doué has that thing all the best players have, the compound eye vision, the ability to freeze, rewind, judge the space and angles around him in the tiniest flicker of everyone else's analogue time. How do you get like this, aged 19, on this stage, a goal and an assist in the opening 20 minutes of the Champions League final, for a team that have never won it, and who you joined only last summer? Doué has been a late-breaking story this season after his move from Rennes. He didn't score his first goal at the Parc des Princes until March. He hadn't scored or assisted in eight games coming into this final. But he is without question the high-ceilinged real deal. Lamine Yamal may be more obviously, cinematically effective. But Doué is at the same level, just more compact and less lavish, the further maths version to Yamal's bold strokes of fine art. By the end here, as another 19-year-old, Senny Mayulu, made it 5-0 against a frazzled Inter, this had become the perfect night for PSG and for the Paris Project, overseen by the unclosing hand of Qatar Sports Investments. First we take the world. Then we take Europe, via Paris, Doha and now Munich. For the state of Qatar and its interests this is football pretty much completed. In the space of three years the world's most relentlessly efficient gas state's outreach arm has won a home World Cup, led by its star player, the emir's tailor's dummy Lionel Messi, and now the greatest club prize. Paris Saint-Germain's French midfielder Desire Doue (C) celebrates with PSG's Portuguese midfielder Joao Neves (2R) and Brazilian defender Marquinhos (R). Pic: INA FASSBENDER/AFP via Getty Images PSG are currently the best team in the world, treble winners and champions of Europe, the scalps of three recent finalists dangling from their belts on that run. And really this was just too easy most of the time, a flaneuring kind of victory against opponents who were always either chasing, panting for breath or windmilling away just out of reach. Munich had spent Saturday baking in the sun, a city already on its summer holidays, green fringes thronged with picnickers, sunbathers and knots of Italian men sweating across the white heat of the Englische Garten in blue and black nylon shirts. The Allianz Arena is an epic, widescreen kind of stage, those steeply tiered stands curving towards a perfectly puckered oval of powder blue above the lip of the roof. Ten minutes before kick-off it was still hot and heavy, the kind of evening that makes you sweat just sitting still. Linkin Park, who must have a very good agent, put on an agreeably energetic pre-match rap-metal stomp-about. A celebrity violinist performed a hideous screeching Seven Nation Army fiddle-along. The giant Parisian tifo was scrolled away. And from the start this was just pain for Inter, a time to run and harry and chase younger and fresher opponents as the Mendes-Vitinha midfield pivot, PSG's velcro-touch directors of traffic, just took the ball away. Physical and mental intensity were always going to be key. PSG have been able to replenish the stocks, let the bruises heal, rest their best players. Inter have been all-in, flailing through a series of crunch end-of-season dates, limbs sloshing with lactic acid all the way to the line. It showed. For 12 minutes this was a kind of smothering. After that it became an extended execution, led by Doué. The first goal came from a lovely piece of applied geometry, all clean crisp lines, made first by Khvicha Kvaratskhelia easing inside two defenders. From there the blue shirts completed a high-speed passing triangle, the key ball from Vitinha pinged hard into the feet of Doué, who had found space by not moving, holding his position while Inter's defenders went to cover. He clipped the ball back for Achraf Hakimi to side-foot into an empty net. Read More Luis Enrique 'emotional' at tribute to his daughter after Champions League win The second goal eight minutes later was a break the full length of the pitch, PSG funnelling out from their own corner flag, finding Ousmane Dembélé in space, there to gallop away, all easy grace, head up, before curling a crossfield pass into the run of Doué. He controlled with his torso, then hit down on the ball at the top of its bounce, a deflection taking it past Sommer. Either side PSG were immaculate. This was box-fresh elite club football, possession, counterpress, swift transitions. At times it's like watching a team of head prefects, a supremely drilled exhibition the Iberian-Catalan Style, with just the right bolt-on parts in every role. This is of course the work of Luis Enrique, who has won 11 out of 11 finals, and who was up from the start at the edge of his rectangle, all in black with white trainers, lithe and animated, revolving both arms, shuttle running left to right, like a mime artist taking part in a gruelling military fitness drill. It has been said Luis Enrique turned to Paris two years ago after being appalled by the despotic owners of Chelsea and Spurs, which is certainly an interesting take on the extraordinary freedoms inherent in the Qatari propaganda project. But he has been the perfect man at the perfect time, the ideologue, the data-based strongman, here just as the years of celebrity overdose are finally cashed in, brand leveraged, income vast enough to leave PSG with a free hand to build a brilliant, hungry, youthful modern team. The idea has been to create a group of anti-stars. Good luck with that. Doué will now take his place, up there floating in his tin can high above the world, the latest addition to the global A-list. From Paris via Doha, with Catalan style, Asturian brains, past the scars of all those glitzy late stage slumps, PSG now stand at the summit. Guardian
Yahoo
2 days ago
- Entertainment
- Yahoo
📸 Champions League: team of the season revealed!
PSG 🤝 Barça A few minutes after crowning Ousmane Dembélé as the best player of the season in the Champions League and Désiré Doué as the best young player, UEFA unveiled the team of the season. Of course, PSG is the most represented team. Two stars from Barça are also included, but also one from Inter and Arsenal. Does this XI seem logical to you? Advertisement This article was translated into English by Artificial Intelligence. You can read the original version in 🇫🇷 here. 📸 MARCO BERTORELLO - AFP or licensors
San Francisco Chronicle
2 days ago
- Sport
- San Francisco Chronicle
Doué's sensational Champions League performance for PSG launches him into a new dimension
PARIS (AP) — Translate Désiré Doué's name into English and you get the words 'coveted' and 'gifted.' Both seem highly appropriate, considering how the 19-year-old's stunning performance for Paris Saint-Germain in Saturday's Champions League final launched him into soccer's stratosphere, making Doué a player every team would love to have. Doué scored with two clinical finishes in a 5-0 rout of Inter Milan after setting up PSG's first goal with a remarkable piece of close control. Controlling the ball on his left foot and spinning in one swift movement inside the penalty area, he then effortlessly switched feet and passed with his right to Achraf Hakimi. 'I really don't have the words to describe how I feel. What we did is magical. We showed we are a great side collectively,' said Doué, who turns 20 on Tuesday. 'There are a lot of young players in the side who still need to improve, I am among them." Doué improving is quite a scary thought, given how good he already is. A game-changing ability When Doué joined PSG from Rennes for around 50 million euros ($55 million) in the offseason, it appeared a hefty fee for an unproven young player. Except for the fans who closely followed Ligue 1, he was largely unknown in France and beyond. Furthermore, his return of eight goals in 76 games hardly suggested he would become a dangerous scorer. But Rennes is one of the best youth academies in European soccer. Doué's PSG teammate Ousmane Dembélé came through the ranks there as did Mathys Tel before joining Bayern Munich. PSG coach Luis Enrique, who coached Lionel Messi, Luis Suárez and Neymar when Barcelona won the Champions League in 2015, saw a game-changing ability in Doué. He was proved right. Doué's emergence in the second part of the season saw him take goal-scoring winger Bradley Barcola's place in the starting lineup. It also coincided with PSG's revival in the Champions League after a difficult group stage where the club lost to Arsenal, Atletico Madrid and Bayern. Doué held his nerve in the penalty shootout win against Liverpool in March, scoring the decisive kick in emphatic style to send PSG into the quarterfinals. Later that month, he also scored for France in a penalty shootout win in the Nations League. Doué kept improving in the big games Doué equalized in the quarterfinal first leg against Aston Villa in Paris and scored five goals in the competition. Overall he scored 15 goals for PSG this season, including spectacular curlers from outside the penalty area with his right foot. His silky close control, allied to an ability to wrong-foot defenders, made him a vital part of PSG's intricate approach play, particularly in confined spaces. His unorthodox dribbling is often brilliant, but does not always come off, so he reigned it in. 'I sometimes overdo it a bit, but I try to keep my personality. When you play, you know there are areas where you have to build, release the ball, and others where you have more freedom,' Doué said. "I analyze my matches and my training sessions a lot. I try to always maintain my discipline, and I hope that will take me to the very, very high level.' Doué said that back in April. On Saturday night he achieved it, and joined Barcelona's 17-year-old prodigy Lamine Yamal among the most coveted young players in world soccer.
Fox Sports
2 days ago
- Sport
- Fox Sports
Doué's sensational Champions League performance for PSG launches him into a new dimension
Associated Press PARIS (AP) — Translate Desire Doue's name into English and you get the words 'coveted' and 'gifted.' Both seem highly appropriate, considering how the 19-year-old's stunning performance for Paris Saint-Germain in Saturday's Champions League final launched him into soccer's stratosphere, making Doué a player every team would love to have. Doué scored with two clinical finishes in a 5-0 rout of Inter Milan after setting up PSG's first goal with a remarkable piece of close control. Controlling the ball on his left foot and spinning in one swift movement inside the penalty area, he then effortlessly switched feet and passed with his right to Achraf Hakimi. 'I really don't have the words to describe how I feel. What we did is magical. We showed we are a great side collectively,' said Doué, who turns 20 on Tuesday. 'There are a lot of young players in the side who still need to improve, I am among them." Doué improving is quite a scary thought, given how good he already is. A game-changing ability When Doué joined PSG from Rennes for around 50 million euros ($55 million) in the offseason, it appeared a hefty fee for an unproven young player. Except for the fans who closely followed Ligue 1, he was largely unknown in France and beyond. Furthermore, his return of eight goals in 76 games hardly suggested he would become a dangerous scorer. But Rennes is one of the best youth academies in European soccer. Doué's PSG teammate Ousmane Dembele came through the ranks there as did Mathys Tel before joining Bayern Munich. PSG coach Luis Enrique, who coached Lionel Messi, Luis Suarez and Neymar when Barcelona won the Champions League in 2015, saw a game-changing ability in Doué. He was proved right. Doué's emergence in the second part of the season saw him take goal-scoring winger Bradley Barcola's place in the starting lineup. It also coincided with PSG's revival in the Champions League after a difficult group stage where the club lost to Arsenal, Atletico Madrid and Bayern. Doué held his nerve in the penalty shootout win against Liverpool in March, scoring the decisive kick in emphatic style to send PSG into the quarterfinals. Later that month, he also scored for France in a penalty shootout win in the Nations League. Doué kept improving in the big games Doué equalized in the quarterfinal first leg against Aston Villa in Paris and scored five goals in the competition. Overall he scored 15 goals for PSG this season, including spectacular curlers from outside the penalty area with his right foot. His silky close control, allied to an ability to wrong-foot defenders, made him a vital part of PSG's intricate approach play, particularly in confined spaces. His unorthodox dribbling is often brilliant, but does not always come off, so he reigned it in. 'I sometimes overdo it a bit, but I try to keep my personality. When you play, you know there are areas where you have to build, release the ball, and others where you have more freedom,' Doué said. "I analyze my matches and my training sessions a lot. I try to always maintain my discipline, and I hope that will take me to the very, very high level.' Doué said that back in April. On Saturday night he achieved it, and joined Barcelona's 17-year-old prodigy Lamine Yamal among the most coveted young players in world soccer. They could face each other on Thursday, when France plays Spain in the Nations League semifinals. Both have the soccer world at their feet. ___ AP soccer:
