Paris Saint-Germain and FC Espaly faced off this Saturday at the Stade Marcel Michelin in the last 16 of the Coupe de France 2024-2025. The match ended in a 2-4 Parisian victory (Espaly/PSG video highlights). After the match, the president of the Auvergne-based team, Christian Perbet, stopped off in the mixed zone. He talked about his relationship with his Parisian counterpart Nasser Al-Khelaïfi.
Perbet “We have to pay tribute to them, because that’s not the image we give them.”
What was your exchange with Nasser Al-Khelaïfi ?
I told him about the fact that I was called Qatar d’Espaly, and he said he’d invite us all to a forthcoming match in his dressing room, so I told him I’d like to take a photo with him, and we had a laugh. But it’s a lot of attention because he got up in the night at one point when he was in Australia to call me. It’s a real process.
It’s both incomprehensible, because we’re nobody, but because PSG respects amateur sport. We have to say it loud and clear, it’s the truth. They make the effort, they help, they are professionals. We have to pay tribute to them, because that’s not the image we give them.
Perbet “We got the word out and we weren’t far behind.”
A financial boost for you ?
We’re going to earn about half our budget. PSG is leaving the takings, as it always does, but that’s something to be said for it too. We’re on track with what we wanted to do when we came here, by bringing in our goals.
We got people talking about us and we weren’t far off. They left the shirts too, they signed. It’s a club that respects its opponents and does what’s necessary, whereas we’re nobody to them.
