Paris Saint-Germain will hold a significant advantage over Arsenal as the two teams head to Budapest for the Champions League final. The French club had league fixtures postponed to allow their players additional recovery time ahead of Champions League clashes against Liverpool and Chelsea this season, and they will enjoy that same benefit against Arsenal in the tournament's showpiece final.
Champions League Final Preview
Both the Gunners and Les Parisiens will go head-to-head in Budapest as this season's Champions League reaches its conclusion. PSG are the defending champions, having thrashed Inter 5-0 in last year's final. Arsenal have reached the final just once before, back in 2006.
Mikel Arteta's side rounded off a superb Premier League title-winning campaign on Sunday against Crystal Palace. PSG, however, last took to the pitch on May 17, when they fell 2-1 to local rivals Paris FC.
This means Luis Enrique's squad will have had 13 days to prepare for the final, while Arsenal, riding high on their top-flight title triumph, will have had just six. That represents a full week's difference in terms of rest, yet PSG are well accustomed to enjoying such a luxury.
Previous Fixture Postponements
Earlier in this Champions League campaign, PSG faced Chelsea in the Round of 16. The opening leg was held in Paris on March 11, with the second leg taking place at Stamford Bridge on March 17. On Saturday, March 14, when Chelsea faced Newcastle United in the Premier League, PSG were due to play Nantes. However, the Ligue de Football Professionnel (LFP) received a request from PSG to postpone the game to allow them to better prepare for the European match, and it was granted.
The fixture against Nantes was rescheduled to April 22, with the French giants going on to thrash Chelsea 5-2 at home before sealing a 3-0 victory in west London. Nantes' manager at the time voiced his displeasure over the fixture reshuffle.
PSG enjoyed three additional days of preparation ahead of the second leg against Chelsea and were handed yet another postponement before their quarter-final clash with Liverpool. Before facing the Reds, PSG had been scheduled to take on RC Lens on April 11, slotted between the two legs against Liverpool. Once again, however, they submitted a request to the LFP, which was duly approved.
This handed PSG a free weekend to recover and strategise before making the trip to Anfield on April 14. They benefitted from six days of rest between both legs, while Liverpool faced Fulham on April 11 and were left with just three days to gear up for the second leg.
PSG's fixture against Lens was pushed back until May 13, sparking even greater controversy than the Nantes postponement. At that point in the season, Lens sat just one point behind PSG in the battle for the Ligue 1 title. They resisted the fixture being rescheduled and issued a strongly worded statement. An excerpt stated: "It does indeed appear to us that a troubling sentiment is taking hold: that of a French championship gradually relegated to the status of an adjustment variable at the whim of the European imperatives of some."
Despite their protests, the match was postponed and PSG advanced past Liverpool 4-0 on aggregate. They also secured their league crown by six points, defeating Lens 2-0 earlier this month. Following their victory over Bayern Munich in the Champions League semi-finals, they will now face the Gunners in the final with a complete seven-day edge in terms of recovery time.
