1994: Champions, Act 2!

Three years after Canal Plus’s takeover of PSG, Les Parisiens achieved their aim: winning the French league title after a record-breaking season and earning themselves and their manager, Artur Jorge, recognition.

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The Match

After a difficult start to the season and two defeats – 1-0 losses away to both Bordeaux and Marseille – Paris Saint-Germain finally got back their Brazilian trio of Ricardo, Raí and Valdo, who had just sent the Auriverde to the 1994 World Cup in the USA.

Artur Jorge was finally able to put out his best XI to take on Auxerre at the Parc des Princes, and Paris would put the game to bed in the first half. From Vincent Guérin’s pass, George Weah beat his defender, followed by the Auxerre goalkeeper, Bruno Martini, before scoring with the outside of his right foot in the 21st minute.

Valdo was at the start of the move for the second goal, playing a perfect ball across to Paul Le Guen, whose low shot from 25 yards out doubled his side’s lead five minutes later.

Paris kept the party going when Raí, having been played in by Weah, pulled off a near-perfect lob that dropped onto Martini’s crossbar. Weah then rounded off a crazy ten-minute spell by heading home from a pinpoint David Ginola cross on the half-hour mark.

Those three goals in nine minutes were followed by the pick of the bunch in the 73rd minute, when an incredible run from Ginola would get the Parc des Princes crowd up on its feet. After chesting the ball down, the Paris striker broke away, avoided two defenders, dummied a cross and beat Martini from an impossible angle.

At full time, the Paris fans gave their players a lengthy ovation after witnessing such an exceptional spectacle. Even the usually-reserved Artur Jorge was left charmed: “For half an hour, we played some very nice stuff. My message is clear: we have to be a well-organised team. Our build-up play was very good and was based on that desire for movement.”

The player

It was an exceptional season for David Ginola, voted the league’s best player and nicknamed “El Magnífico” by the Spanish press, who had succumbed to the Paris striker’s charm.

Paris Saint-Germain’s top scorer netted 13 goals in 38 league games and showed incredible strength of character to pick himself up from the criticism he received following Les Bleus’ elimination from World Cup qualifying at the hands of Emil Kostadinov’s Bulgaria on 17th November 1993. Ginola did his talking on the pitch, alongside strike partner George Weah, to lead Les Rouge et Bleu to the one and only French league title of the Canal Plus era.

The image

Ricardo’s joy against Toulouse or the trophy being handed out against Bordeaux.

The figure

Eight years after setting the previous record with their first French league title, Paris Saint-Germain would beat their longest-ever unbeaten streak with a run of 27 matches without defeat in the league.

Better still, Les Parisiens went 37 competitive fixtures without losing, with just 14 goals conceded as well as 24 clean sheets kept by a rock-solid defence and a centre-back pairing of Ricardo and Alain Roche in front of the unplayable Bernard Lama in between the sticks for Les Rouge et Bleu.

The highlights

The highlights of the 1993/94 season.

The anecdote

Paris Saint-Germain travelled to Lille, whose Stade Grimonprez-Jooris had consistently proven to be a bogey ground for Les Parisiens, who hadn’t managed to win there even once since the club’s return to the top flight in 1974.

18 matches (14 losses and four draws) later, relief finally came through goals from Raí and Xavier Gravelaine.

Paris consolidated their position at the top of the league table, and no team would catch them by the time they eventually clinched the title against Toulouse on 30th April 1994.

The statement

« In that squad, none of the players let things go to their head. The reason for that is simple: we were aware of the aim that we wanted to achieve. In every game, we felt as though nothing could stop us. We had chemistry, and we were solid in defence, strong in midfield and permanently dangerous in attack. If someone wasn’t playing well, they always had a teammate to help them. »