This Saturday, as part of the ninth matchday of Ligue 1 2025-2026, Paris Saint-Germain faced Brest at the Stade Francis Le Blé. Eric Roy, coach of the Brest team, spoke at a press conference after Paris’s 3-0 victory. He spoke about the pain of playing against Paris, using a very unusual comparison.
Roy: “It’s much more difficult, and I was going to say, it hurts a lot more.”
“It’s funny because I was at the dentist three days ago. I had a filling come out. I can assure you that it’s much harder to face PSG than to go to the dentist. Much harder, and I was going to say, it hurts a lot more. Because I have an unfortunate tendency to watch my players run after the ball, run with them, and suffer with them. So today, inevitably, we suffered a lot.
Less hope than before.
Three or four years ago, when we played against PSG, when we were preparing for matches, I always said to my boys, OK, they’re a great team, they’ve got some outstanding players, we’ll have to be careful, they might make the difference, but at any moment, we’ll be able to hold our own in the game, we’ll be able to hold our own in the game, because we’ll be able to pass the ball around and create chances.
And now, today, it’s getting more and more complicated. Even in the run-up to the match, for a long time, I asked myself: ‘What can I say to my players to try and convince them that we can compete in this match? ’ That’s it. We almost did it, but we failed again.”, comments reported by L’Equipe.
At least we can agree that Eric Roy knows how to speak very honestly and with phrases that are a little different from the usual. And we understand his thinking. This PSG seems to be a very special challenge, full of difficulties. In particular, because coach Luis Enrique knows how to change the players on the field while always maintaining a philosophy that is exhausting for the opponent.
He does this while knowing how to adapt to the other team. The Parisians very often find solutions against a low block, when faced with pressing, if the opponent wants to counter quickly, if they are looking to get the ball… So, the opposing coach has to think long and hard to prepare his team. In the end, there is very often a feeling that his players were powerless against Paris.
But we must remain hopeful, because a match is never decided in advance and no one can always win. The key is to convey this hope to the players, without letting a goal conceded become a tragedy either. There is nothing to avoid. Brest played to their strengths, without being able to count on Paris being off form. But they didn’t give up, which is always positive.
