Last week, for the first time in nearly a decade, Paris Saint-Germain opened its season without Neymar, Lionel Messi or Kylian Mbappe. Two years ago, it had all three — and a payroll of $803 million, the highest in club soccer history.
But the change in strategy doesn’t signal a change in ambition or a reluctance on the part of the team’s Qatari president, Nasser Al-Khelaifi, to keep spending. What it does mean, however, is that Al-Khelaifi plans to chase that ambition by spending in a different way.
“I was asked who will be PSG’s star [this] year,” Al-Khelaifi said at last spring’s Globe Soccer Awards.