Deadly Villans could have been firing for PSG instead

Marco Asensio and Marcus Rashford have a point to prove in the Champions League quarter-final against Les Parisiens

- RICHARD JOLLY

It was the first penalty Marcus Rashford had ever taken for Manchester United. It was surely the most pressurised he ever would. Kylian Mbappe could only stand and watch. The World Cup-winning goalkeeper Gianluigi Buffon was at least able to dive but Rashford rifled it over him.

The away-goals rule meant the scenario was all or nothing, elimination or progress, deep into added time at the Parc des Princes. United’s underdogs had lost at home. Their resources were so depleted that Tahith Chong came on in the away leg. Against Mbappe and Buffon, Thiago Silva, Dani Alves and Marquinhos, Edinson Cavani and Angel Di Maria. Rashford scored.

It may have been a memory from 2019 that the beaten manager Thomas Tuchel carried with him when he recalled the Mancunian to the England squad last month. It might have been a reason, too, why Paris Saint-Germain maintained an interest in him for quite some time.

Six years on, he has made it back to the Parc des Princes for a defining Champions League tie; but in the claret and blue of Aston Villa. His teammates include Marco Asensio; PSG firmed up their interest in the serial Champions League winner and signed him in 2023. They loaned him out 18 months later.

His return offers a vision of a PSG that used to be and a Villa that is now: there is aspiration in Aston, big wages paid for glamour loanees with the prospect of a considerable return, whether by winning the FA Cup or recording a top-five finish but, even before then, of a first European Cup quarter-final in 42 years.