Tuchel: ‘Struggled to control their counterattacks’

Thomas Tuchel (Paris Saint-Germain coach)
“In the first half we struggled to control their counterattacks. We didn’t play well with two up front and we changed the formation to play with just Choupo-Moting up front in the second half. Strasbourg had chances. We are missing a lot of players, our players are very tired and we weren’t able to score that third goal. We had the opportunity to be crowned champions tonight, but we didn’t do it. It’s my fault tonight. We were missing several players tonight. We should have tried to control the match and not try to attack so much. It was my decision and my fault.”

Thilo Kehrer (Paris Saint-Germain defender)
“We made a good start, but we lost our shape and Strasbourg took advantage. To score my first goal? It was a great feeling. From Julian Draxler’s corner, I was going to make a run to the front post and I saw there was another player so I stopped my run and the ball came to me. But we didn’t win, even though we fought all the way to the end.”

Thiago Silva (Paris Saint-Germain defender)
“Strasbourg defended very well and countered very well too. The first half was very difficult. We started well but then me made some mistakes and conceded that goal on the counter. We didn’t score that all-important second goal and then we conceded a second. We played better in the second half, Kylian Mbappé was excellent when he came on. We deserved to be champions tonight on that second half performance, but now we are going to work hard for Lille.”

Julian Draxler (Paris Saint-Germain midfielder)
“We were really motivated to get the win and win the league on front of our fans, but we didn’t play well enough. We didn’t deserve to win tonight, but we will be champions soon. Strasbourg’s counter attacks caused us a lot of problems. Unfortunately we didn’t get that third goal. Lille are a very good team, second in the league. It will be a tough game, but we will have some players back and we will give it everything.”

Leandro Paredes (Paris Saint-Germain midfielder)
“We knew that we could be champions in our stadium… We were ready and we played well, but we conceded those two goals and we didn’t do enough with the ball. We could have scored in the final minutes. Thilo’s goal was very important, we thought we could win it in the last ten minutes, but we didn’t get there.”