Simon Kuper on the rise of PSG | Financial Times

Simon Kuper on the rise of PSG | Financial Times:

After Paris Saint-Germain qualified for the first Champions League final of their history earlier this week, I went to see a friend who has supported the club since his childhood in a concrete 1970s suburb of Paris. He and I take our kids to PSG’s home stadium, the Parc des Princes, whenever we can scrounge scarce tickets. On a good night in the stands, we have even done “the Poznan” together — the dance where you link arms and turn your backs to the field and jump up and down. 

Now, with the peak of his life as a supporter looming — Sunday’s final against Bayern Munich in Lisbon — he was in a reflective mood. He admitted to feeling unease that his club’s rise had been funded by rich Qatari owners: “It’s like you cheated at Monopoly and suddenly you have all these hotels on the board.” Yet he was relieved by the success, partly because the alternative would be more years of mockery from rival fans, who say, “Even with all this money, you can’t get past the quarter-finals of the Champions League.” He felt that PSG had finally overcome what the French call, in franglais, “la lose” — “failure”. And like a true fan, who cannot entirely distinguish between himself and his club, he thought this might presage the end of “la lose” in his own entrepreneurial career. 

The popular misconception of PSG is that it’s a “fake” club, without history or identity, created by Qatari money and supported only by glory-hunters and children. In fact, the club has millions of longtime supporters, mostly in the unlovely suburbs of Europe’s largest metropolitan area. PSG might have been founded only in 1970, nearly a century later than many English clubs, but Greater Paris is a newish creation too. As with every football club that matters to people, PSG’s story echoes that of the place it represents.