Paris Saint-Germain's Bid for a Third Consecutive Title, Arsenal's Awakening, and Como's Decisions in Their Debut Campaign—The Champions League League Phase Kicks Off, Testing the Idea of "An Accumulation of Choices"
What the pursuit of a third straight title illuminates
The new chapter of the Champions League, now called the league phase rather than the group stage, has quietly opened once again this season.
At the end of the long journey involving 36 clubs awaits the final in Madrid.
The two clubs seen as closest to that stage are Paris Saint-Germain and Arsenal.
PSG have already achieved back-to-back titles.
Should they reach the summit again this season, it would be the first three-peat since Real Madrid's achievement from 2015 to 2018.
Looking purely at the numbers, it's clear just how rare such a feat would be.
But for now, I'd like to step back a little from that framing.
Not a question of winning or losing, but of why they keep managing to stay there.
What Luis Enrique keeps asking himself
Opinions about PSG manager Luis Enrique have been far from uniform since the start of the season.
There's a sense that the team he leads has positioned the league phase as a time for preparation, continuing to experiment with how they play.
Judging by results alone, it looks unstable.
But is that instability really weakness?
Throughout his long career, Luis Enrique has been obsessed with the very mechanics of how football moves.
Rather than imposing rigid patterns on his players, he tries to build a team that thinks for itself about what's best in each moment and acts accordingly.
Sometimes that looks brilliant, sometimes it looks clumsy.
But the sight of a team pushing forward while accepting that instability might be a kind of strength that exists apart from results.
His style, often described with words like 'high-intensity football' and 'relentless pressing,' demands enormous judgment from his players.
There are countless moments within ninety minutes where simply executing instructed movements isn't enough.
In those moments, players have no choice but to think for themselves and choose for themselves.
If that accumulation is what instills something in a team, then the 'instability' of the early season might not be mere drift, but a deliberate build-up.
What the presence of Kvaratskhelia teaches us
Among the players drawing attention in this season's Champions League, the name Khvicha Kvaratskhelia comes up again and again.
Thriving on PSG's left flank, he has colored the last two Champions League campaigns with his two-footed technique capable of cutting in from either side, and his sense for how a match is flowing.
The fact that his name comes up as a Ballon d'Or candidate is itself proof of what he's built up.
Still, I feel that his cutting runs from the left aren't merely a product of technique.
That choice, in that instant, is an accumulation of judgments: go inside, go outside, or play the ball back.
Whether to take on a packed defense or use a teammate.
He repeats that split-second choice dozens of times, every single match.
The description of him as 'a player who makes you lean forward off the sofa' probably comes from the tension generated by that continuous stream of decisions.
More than whether the choice turns out right, it's the will to choose something in that instant that draws in the viewer, I think.
The place Arsenal have arrived at
Arsenal, sitting atop the statistical models' title-probability rankings, enter this season having reached last season's final.
Having experienced their first final since the 2005-06 season, what did they take away from it?
The result was defeat.
But behind the description of this Mikel Arteta-led team as one that is 'finding its way of playing while winning' this season, I imagine there's a digestion of that experience.
A team that doesn't drag along the memory of defeat, yet doesn't forget it either, but absorbs it and takes the next step forward, is not simply strong, but a team that keeps something intact without breaking.
Word has it that Martin Ødegaard, back from last season's injury, has been in good form early this season.
The observation that players are starting to feel 'released' as the team gains confidence to play is an interesting one when thinking about the relationship between the collective and the individual.
It might sound paradoxical that a team becoming more stable allows individuals to become freer.
But in reality, the clearer a team's direction becomes, the more easily players can trust their own judgment and act on it.
I also sense that Ødegaard's ability to control a game comes not only from his being a special player, but from the team being in a state where it trusts his judgment to act.
What first-time clubs bring with them
This season's Champions League sees four clubs, Como, LASK, Sabah and Viking, appear on the stage for the first time.
Among them, Como, led by Cesc Fàbregas, has drawn considerable interest.
The sight of a former star who once played for Arsenal and Barcelona shaping his own football with the trust of his club is too rich a story to simply consume as a 'fun anecdote.'
Fàbregas is said to have turned down offers from other clubs for the past two years to stay at Como.
He has let go of options that might have offered a bigger stage, more resources, greater acclaim.
Why he did so is something only he can know.
But there must have been some conviction behind that choice.
A will to keep testing the direction he believes in, within a team that is still not complete.
The description of him as someone who 'went against the current, and before he knew it, found himself at the cutting edge of modern football' is perhaps a phrase only earned by someone unafraid to take his time.
What Bayern and Harry Kane carry
Harry Kane of Bayern Munich is said to be having a season this year with the Ballon d'Or in mind.
At Tottenham, he went for years without a title.
His move to Bayern has been discussed from many angles, but for Kane now, what matters is less 'why he moved' and more the ongoing accumulation of 'what he can show on this stage.'
It's said that he feels Bayern's style suits him, but I don't think that refers only to tactical compatibility.
The sight of a player choosing an environment where he can show who he truly is, and trying to give everything he has there, carries something that resonates with players at any level.
Standing at the entrance to a long journey
Now that the Champions League league phase has begun, no one can yet guarantee what comes 'after March.'
Clubs deemed likely to win it all, and clubs making their first appearance, stand at the very same starting point.
Experts' predictions cross paths, statistics line up numbers, and yet no one knows the outcome of that final match.
That, I feel, is the irresistible pull that lies at the bottom of what football is.
Why did the player make that choice?
Why did the manager choose that style?
Why does the club keep walking that path?
That accumulation is what, on a night in June, paints a single picture in Madrid.
If I were the one standing on that pitch, what choices would I bring with me?
Thinking about that alone while watching a match might not be a bad way to spend one's time.
The one watching is also mid-choice
There are people who keep watching football even after leaving the pitch. In stadiums, in front of screens, or in the news alerts on their phones. Some follow only the results of matches, while others try to read, through the match itself, how players move, what the manager demands, and what the team is trying to build.
There's a strength in Luis Enrique's attempt to move forward while accepting 'instability' that seems to exist apart from the results. Perhaps because I was once on that side myself, once a player facing choices, I feel I understand the meaning of that instability before I can even put it into words.
Those who watch are swept up in the highs and lows of results, but somewhere they can't let go of the question, 'why did he choose that?' That may be a question shared equally by those who have set football at a distance and those who still head to the pitch every weekend. As long as that question persists, football stays alive within that person.
A little more on the CL league phase
- What Japanese players and coaches can learn from PSG's Luis Enrique and their consecutive Champions League triumphs: building a team that doesn't rely on stars, and how to question mentality and player selection
- From a city of 50,000 to the top of Europe—how Bodø/Glimt's example undermines the excuse that 'conditions aren't right, so it's impossible'
- The narrow distance between 'dominance' and 'victory' that PSG learned in Lisbon
