Marquinhos, look back on a historic European century
After playing his first Champions League game for Paris Saint-Germain in September 2013, the Brazilian brought up the century of appearances in the competition in the play-off first leg. Join us to take a look back on his European journey.
The story started well. On the pitch at the Stadio Georgios Karaiskakis, on 17 September 2013, Marquinhos made his European debut for Paris Saint-Germain. It was a baptism of fire for the 19-year-old defender in the Champions League against Greek giants Olympiacos that he celebrated by opening his account with a goal in a 4-1 win that got his European career off to the very best of starts.
Nearly 12 years later, São Paulo-born defender reached the milestone of 100 UEFA Champions League games as the Parisians won 3-0 at Brest in the knockout stage play-off first leg. What's more, he has played every minute of all 100 matches.
A cornerstone of the club, the Brazil international is now well ahead of another iconic legend, Marco Verratti (79 matches), and the Italian midfielder is the teammate with whom "Marqui" has played the most in the competition (62 games). His 54 wins in the competition is also a club record.
It is a unique journey during which he has faced some of the biggest teams in Europe: FC Barcelona (9 games), Real Madrid and Bayern Munich (7). Only Toni Kroos (109 matches), Robert Lewandowski (106) and Manuel Neuer (101) have started more games in the competition than the Parisian captain since he made his debut (98). He is ahead of the likes of Luka Modric (96), Koke (96), Karim Benzema (92) and David Alaba (92).
This is the ideal opportunity to check out this feature video on our captain's storied career in European competition.
