After managing to hold onto his star player when it looked likely he would depart for Real Madrid, Paris Saint-Germain President Nasser Al-Khelaifi has promised “a lot of changes” in order to “create a new era” at the club.
Even as recently as a couple of weeks ago, it looked highly improbable that Kylian Mbappe would remain in the French capital. Images and videos emerged of him dining in Madrid, as a move to Real began to look inevitable.
After a tumultuous season that saw PSG win only the Ligue 1 title — a trophy that under fire head coach Mauricio Pochettino admitted “wasn’t enough” to match the club’s ambitions — and crumble in dramatic fashion once again in the Champions League, it would have been hard to imagine a bright future for the French side had Mbappe left for free.
Even with Lionel Messi and Neymar in PSG’s ranks, there is no doubt that Mbappe is the club’s most prized asset both on the pitch and economically.
There is a palpable sense of relief around the Parc des Princes that PSG has been able to convince its young superstar to sign a new three-year contract, but Al-Khelaifi insists there is still a lot of work to be done over the summer.
“For sure there are a lot of changes that are going to happen,” the PSG president told CNN’s Amanda Davies in Paris. “We’re going to announce it probably [at the] end of the week.”
Those words will sound particularly ominous to Pochettino and PSG’s sporting director Leonardo, as speculation grows over the pair’s future at the Parisian club.
When pressed on whether there will be a new manager in charge in the dugout, Al-Khelaifi replied: “We want to create a new era of Paris Saint-Germain; a new project, fresh air. I think it’s really important that everybody gets motivated again.
“The loss in the Champions League was not easy, which I take responsibility [for],” added Al-Khelaifi, referring to the quarterfinal defeat by Real Madrid, despite PSG dominating both legs of the tie.
“I’m the president and I’m responsible, but anything can happen and anything will happen in the future. I’m not blaming anyone, whoever will stay or will leave, I’m one of the first one responsible with anything, the results.
“So I’m not blaming anyone and this is really important for me, but in the end, you know, we have choices to do. We have decisions to take. “We [will] take some of them, some of them are coming soon and I think that really what we want to achieve basically [is] to be stronger than last season — and that’s the only objective I want, to be bigger than last season.”
