Defending champions Paris Saint-Germain will visit Villarreal at 9 pm on Tuesday and aim to continue their flawless start to the Champions League phase despite a thinned-out attack.
Villarreal are in 19th place with three points after three games, but have scored every time in the Champions League and want to score again after the 0-1 home defeat against Espanyol in the first competitive game against PSG.
Villarreal lost their opening match at Borussia Dortmund 2-3, beat Napoli 3-1 at home and lost 3-4 at Liverpool after leading 2-0 after less than 30 minutes.
Georges Mikautadze, the club’s top scorer with five goals, put Villarreal ahead in Liverpool after less than four minutes.
Pape Gueye follows with three goals, and Alberto Moleiro is the team’s most important playmaker with four assists.
Villarreal lost 0-1 to Espanyol at the weekend, remaining without scoring a goal in their two most recent home games, following their defeat on the 17th. October had already seen a goalless draw against Elche, and with twelve points from eleven games, they are in eighth place in the La Liga table.
In between, the team of coach Iñigo Pérez, who took over the club from Rayo Vallecano in the summer and is playing his first top-flight season with Villarreal, won 2-1 in Valencia, despite Gueye receiving a red card there.
As 19. Villarreal is currently in the playoff zone, as places nine to 24 lead into the playoffs, while only the top eight advance directly to the round of 16.
PSG have won all three games so far in the league phase, 6-1 against Slovan Bratislava, 4-2 at Manchester City and 4-2 against FC Barcelona, and lead the table with nine points and a goal difference of +9.
Aston Villa, Liverpool, Real Madrid and Real Betis also have nine points, with only the Birmingham club having the same goal difference of +9 as PSG.
In Ligue 1, Luis Enrique’s team leads with 20 points, two ahead of Lille, and most recently won against Lyon (2-0) and at Le Havre (5-1).
In the 5-1 win in Le Havre, Enrique rested players including Vitinha, João Neves, Fabián Ruiz, Désiré Doué and Willian Pacho, while right-back Achraf Hakimi scored a hat trick.
With seven goals this season, Ferran Torres leads the Paris goalscoring charts and scored three against Slovan Bratislava, which will be given additional weight in Tuesday’s game because Khvicha Kvaratskhelia and Ousmane Dembélé will both be missing.
