Preview: PSG host Le Havre with title in reach

This Saturday evening, Paris Saint-Germain will welcome AC Le Havre to the Parc des Princes. The leaders will surely have one eye on next week’s UEFA Champions League tie against Borussia Dortmund, but will be ready to defend their Ligue 1 Uber Eats title, knowing that a win will be enough to secure their third straight championship.

The hosts will hope that this match will be less nervy than the reverse fixture in early December. In that match, Gianluigi Donnarumma was sent off after just ten minutes, forcing Luis Enrique to turn little-used Arnau Tenas. The Spaniard impressed in goal, making seven saves in a 2-0 win, as Kylian Mbappé and Vitinha both found the net for the visitors.

Doble atajada de Arnau Tenas en su primer partido en el PSG 👊🏻#BlockOfTheGame, presentado por @cryptocom#HACPSG pic.twitter.com/9PbTL8k8Om

— Paris Saint-Germain (@PSG_espanol) December 4, 2023

At the time Le Havre were solidly mid-table, and one of the league’s strongest sides at home, hitting their stride under Luka Elsner, but the visitors’ situation is quite different at present. With just one win in Ligue 1 Uber Eats since January, the Normandy side have slid down the table at a precipitous rate and now sit sixteenth, synonymous with a place in the relegation playoffs come the end of the season. Their match last week against FC Metz should have provided a tonic to that, as a win over Les Grenats at home would have put them five points ahead of the eastern side, but a 0-1 loss prevented that from being the case and now André Ayew and company will need to dig deep over the season’s final four matches to preserve their top-flight status.

Tactically, Le Havre are expected to line up with a five-man defence, as they regularly have against bigger sides, with Ayew, Christopher Opéri and Abdoulaye Touré all back from suspensions and in Elsner’s reckoning. Luis Enrique is likely to counter with his familiar 4-3-3, but should rotate his side heavily, much as he did against Olympique Lyonnais on Sunday in a 4-1 win. Even with rotation likely, the leaders are still a formidable task for any opponent, and will surely be up for the task given the opportunity to all but secure the Ligue 1 Uber Eats title ahead of second-place AS Monaco‘s match against Lyon tomorrow evening.

Predicted lineups:

Paris Saint-Germain (4-3-3): Navas; Hakimi, Marquinhos, Pereira, Beraldo; Zaïre-Emery, Ugarte, Lee; Asensio, Ramos, Barcola

AC Le Havre (3-5-2): Desmas; Lloris, Youté, Sanganté; Nego, Kuzyayev, Targhaline, Kechta, Opéri; Sabbi, Ayew