With Qatari investment, pressure on PSG to deliver

Posted Monday, August 01, 2011 by YAHOO Sport

LONDON (AP)—Despite an offseason of heavy spending, Paris Saint-Germain is still a work in progress a week before its French League opener against Lorient.

The pressure on coach Antoine Kombouare to deliver will still be unrelenting, after the arrival of new players worth more than $100 million in the two months since a member of Qatar’s royal family took over the club.

“The players will be severely tested every week, everyone will want to beat Paris,” PSG coach Antoine Kombouare said Sunday through a translator.

Kombouare cautioned after his preseason preparations ended with a 3-0 victory over Boca Juniors in an Emirates Cup match at Arsenal’s stadium that success “won’t happen in a day.”

“Next Saturday will be tough and we need to keep working hard,” he said. “The new recruits need time because the players need to settle down and to settle with each other … even after the match against Lorient, we must keep working.

“There are many situations we need to prepare for tactically and strategically.”

The signings since the end of last season include goalkeepers Nicolas Douchez and Salvatore Sirigu, defender Milan Bisevac, midfielders Jeremy Menez, Blaise Matuidi and Mohamed Sissoko, and striker Kevin Gameiro.

“Everyone is expecting something out of us after we invested a lot of money and talented players were recruited,” Kombouare said. “Now we need to stress the point they are young talent, they haven’t won anything yet. They have to make their history, they have to win trophies and that’s what I am expecting from them.”

Arsenal’s French manager, Arsene Wenger, has described PSG as a “French Manchester City,” which has spent hundreds of millions on players in the three years under Abu Dhabi ownership.

“The new PSG are on a different economic plane,” Wenger said. “They live on a different financial planet and no other French club can compete with them. It’s good for French football that they are capable of buying top players.”

There was setback Saturday when PSG lost 1-0 to the New York Red Bulls in the Emirates Cup, but the Parisians recovered with a convincing win over Boca thanks to goals from Jean-Eudes Maurice, Guillaume Hoarau and captain Marcos Ceara.

Now PSG can focus on far bigger prizes.

The pressure from Sheik Tamim Bin Hamad Al Thani, whose Qatar Sports Investments now owns 70 percent of PSG, is for the team to win the league and qualify for the Champions League.

“When you have pressure you want to win everything and go as far as possible—we like the pressure,” Kombouare said. “I hope we will win the title. Our goal is to go to the Champions League, but we have to look that last season we finished fourth … now we have to move forward with new players to another level.”

There could be further changes in store before the transfer window closes on Aug. 31.

“Those who do not fit into my sport project will have to leave,” Kombouare said.