In search of qualification for the semi-finals of the Champions League against Barça on Tuesday evening at Montjuïc (9 p.m. live on RMC Sport), PSG will once again be able to count on the fervor of 3,000 supporters in the visiting park. As with every European trip, the Parisian fans, led by the CUP ultras, often win the match from the stands.
February 12, 2019. The date remains engraved in the memory of PSG supporters. That day, the Parisian team played a Champions League round of 16 first leg match on Manchester United’s pitch. Nearly 3,700 Parisian fans are traveling to the north of England. None of them will forget this dream day concluded by the victory of the Parisians at Old Trafford (0-2, goals from Kimpembe and Mbappé). “Everything was perfect,” summarizes Fred, a former PSG subscriber in the 2000s and used to traveling in the Champions League.
From the gathering in Exchange Square, one of Manchester’s main squares, to the tram ride leading to the “theater of dreams”, Parisian supporters are setting the stage like never before. And impress the British. “These are incredible scenes, we can say that PSG supporters invaded Exchange Square,” reports a journalist for the Manchester Evening News. On the networks, videos of melting Parisian fans are playing in a loop. “I’ve never seen that. We were at home,” remembers Lucas, another PSG supporter present that day in Manchester. For a large number of Parisian supporters, this victory for the Red Devils still represents their best travel memory. It is also a tipping point.
>> Barça-PSG: LIVE information
“Before the arrival of the CUP, the atmosphere was a little sluggish”
By making such an impression, the PSG visitor park has established itself as one of the most important in Europe. If Paris has a long history in the European Cup, we will have to wait until 2016 and the return of the ultras to the stands after the Leproux plan to see the visitor parking space change in size. A metamorphosis that can be summed up in three letters: CUP, like Collectif Ultras Paris. “Before the arrival of the CUP, travel was not very organized, it was a bit family-oriented, the atmosphere was a bit lazy. With the CUP, we saw the arrival of tarpaulins, megaphones, groups compact, remembers Fred, long close to the Auteuil groups, this thirty-year-old reconnected with the trips motivated by the Ultras Paris Collective. “It created a new fervor,” adds Lucas, another regular at PSG trips in Europe.
PSG players greet their supporters at Old Trafford on February 12, 2019 © AFP
With the procession, Parisians ignite European cities
Quickly, former leaders of the Auteuil stand liaised with the new ones, many of whom came from the K-Soce Team. A new dynamic is taking place. The CUP gives a new dimension to PSG’s trips in the Champions League. Travel across Europe is made with the six double-decker coaches available to the Collectif Ultras Paris. For its part, the club always employs the same security service (around fifteen people) to support and supervise the fans.
On the program on match days, a meeting point is given in a large square before the departure of a massive procession to the stadium (often supervised by the police), just to raise the temperature, to get excited fumis and warm the vocal cords. The inhabitants of Madrid, Dortmund or Manchester still remember it… In the stadium, the CUP occupies most of the time the lower part of the visitor’s parking lot, which allows it to install its tarpaulins and train the whole group as well as possible with him.
When PSG’s parking spoils MU’s warm-up
Outside, the Parisian supporters quickly understood the importance of the first minutes spent in the park. Lucas: “When we enter the stadium, for the first song, we shout: “Paris! Paris!” It sounds crazy! We give everything we have. It gives me shivers. And I’m sure it helps the players! It gives extra strength.”
It can also destabilize opponents, like at Old Trafford five years ago: “We ruined the Manchester warm-up, rewinds Fred. Guys like Pogba, you could see that they were disturbed, from the warm-up in their own stadium!” The power of nuisance also depends a lot on the location of the parking lot. If this is ideal in England, often near the pitch and a goal, it is on the other hand placed at the very top of the stadium at Camp Nou, at Santiago Bernabeu or at the Allianz Arena: “It’s hard to to be heard”, regrets Fred.
Liverpool fans completely amazed
But whatever the location, the objective for visiting supporters is always to win the match from the stands. “For some ultras, it’s even more important than PSG’s victory,” assures Fred. This match within a match, Parisian supporters rarely lose. During the 2018-2019 European campaign, 2,500 PSG fans already impressed during a trip to Anfield against Liverpool (3-2 defeat) for the first day of the group stage.
“The best supporters I have ever seen, they sang non-stop for two hours,” writes Robbie Auton, Reds fan on ) splits completely from one message to The team: “If you get the chance, congratulate the PSG fans for the way they supported their team, and for the wonderful noise they made. They also showed how much they love Liverpool. Red All Over the Land considers them to have been magnificent.” Fred remembers: “Anfield sings but not from start to finish. That forced them to sing more or listen to the songs of the Parisians. There, they said to themselves, ‘the Parisians are solid!'” The meeting ended with applause from Liverpool supporters to PSG fans.
Anti-Marseillais chants with Neapolitan ultras
Over the course of their travels, the PSG visitor parking lot has become massive and attractive. Today it has become much more difficult, especially financially, to get tickets (fans often have to take days off). The most fervent supporters have built a solid reputation in Europe to the point of today finding certain audiences, however reputed to be hotheaded, “overrated” like those in Liverpool or Dortmund. “We put everyone to bed. In Dortmund, we only heard us,” says Mathieu, a regular traveler. In Naples, the Parisians have established friendly ties with certain Neapolitan ultras. In November 2018, for the return of Edinson Cavani to San Paolo (the former name of the Maradona stadium), the two camps sang in unison in praise of the Uruguayan striker during the warm-up.
Some Neapolitan ultras also took part in the procession of Parisians in the streets of Naples. They too chanted anti-Marseillais songs. “We gained the respect of all of Europe,” says Fred. “We are known for singing from the warm-up until the end without interruption. That gave us credit in the eyes of our opponents. “foreigner. The other side of the coin is that we are sometimes expected like in Milan where it was a bit hot.” The situation is not always so idyllic.
PSG supporters in Milan © ICON Sport
Distrust, tensions and incidents
As in France, Paris Saint-Germain often has to deal with the distrust of opposing supporters: “When PSG comes, you see it, you can hear it, there are the fumis…”, underlines Mathieu. “The goal is to show that PSG is not just Qatar and money,” recalls Lucas. Incidents and fights are not rare like in Newcastle and therefore in Milan this season. In Belgrade, where the 500 Parisians were escorted by the police, monkey cries were heard in the Serbian camp. These tensions are not new but they have been increasing for several months. “But it’s not specific to PSG, Mathieu nuance. We see that it’s booming all over Europe. In Milan, it’s true that it was hot. Milan is strong, there’s more of a culture of fanism , the stadium is “giantism” and then with the scenario of the match (2-1), the stadium was crazy. We were less heard.
With the broadcast of videos on certain websites, the climate has become a little tense in certain countries such as Italy, but also in the Netherlands, Greece or Turkey, to the point of dampening the enthusiasm of certain PSG supporters. , more cautious about the idea of taking the plane to support the Parisian team. This will not be the case on Tuesday at the Lluis-Companys Olympic stadium in Montjuïc where nearly 3,000 Parisian supporters are meeting for the quarter-final second leg of the Champions League against Barça. With this time again, the hope of extinguishing the Catalan fans. And to push Kylian Mbappé and his partners into the last four of the Champions League.
Aurélien Brossier with Arthur Perrot
