PSG vs Real Madrid: lots of glamour and gold, but no goals

Paris and Madrid. Two of the world's most glamorous cities, and home to the two most expensively assembled football teams on the planet – but Paris Saint-Germain and Real Madrid proved that there is more to life than glitter and gold as their riches failed to provide and goals during a dour draw in the French capital.

Not even Cristiano Ronaldo and Zlatan Imbrahimovic could sprinkle their stardust on the occasion as the two sides, worth a combined £400m, failed to click at Parc des Princes.

"There were high hopes for the meeting of the heaviest of football's two financial heavyweights, but it ended without either side landing a punch," says Sam Munnery in The Times. "Real are the side that PSG's Qatari owners want to emulate but, on this evidence, that is a low bar to have set."

Subscribe to The Week

Escape your echo chamber. Get the facts behind the news, plus analysis from multiple perspectives.

SUBSCRIBE & SAVE

Sign up for The Week's Free Newsletters

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

From our morning news briefing to a weekly Good News Newsletter, get the best of The Week delivered directly to your inbox.

Sign up

The result leaves Real and PSG level on points at the top of Group A and in good shape to progress to the last 16.

"Two of the most expensively assembled teams in the history of the modern game, and combined revenues in excess of €1bn, but for all the petrodollars and old Spanish money poured into these clubs there was barely a sight of goal worthy of the name between them on Wednesday night," laments Sam Wallace in the Daily Telegraph.

Real were without several injured stars, including Karim Benzema and Gareth Bale, but "much was still expected from the two sports teams which pay the biggest wages in the world", reports CNN.

Despite all the money sloshing around "nobody could cash in their chances" adds the US broadcaster, which notes it was the first time that Real had failed to score in a Champions League group game for seven years.