Maybe Paris Saint-Germain defender Achraf Hakimi was right after all when he said teammate Nuno Mendes is the best left back in the world right now.
Mendes sure looked like one of the best in the position on Wednesday, keeping star Barcelona forward Lamine Yamal at bay and assisting in one of PSG's goals in a 2-1 win over the Catalan club in the Champions League.
Hakimi, a right back who assisted in Gonçalo Ramos' 90th-minute winner for defending champion PSG, had said ahead of the game that Yamal “will be playing against the best left back in the world.”
“He is capable of stopping Lamine,” Hakimi said of Mendes, who was named man of the match.
Yamal got off to a promising start Wednesday, awing the crowd with a great run just minutes into the match at Montjuic stadium. But he couldn’t do much more after that, with the 23-year-old Mendes containing him most of the time.
“I’m very pleased to see the younger players thriving in this match; learning, playing well, impressing our fans,” PSG coach Luis Enrique coach said. “We consistently play rivals of a really high level. The most important thing for me is our DNA, our attitude — as a squad and as a club — and that’s what we saw today.”
The 18-year-old Yamal made his first start for Barcelona since August because of a pubic-area injury sustained while playing with Spain’s national team during the international break in September. He came off the bench for the Catalan club in its 2-1 win against Real Sociedad in the Spanish league on Sunday.
It was a run by Mendes down the left side that led to Senny Mayulu's 38th-minute equalizer for PSG after Ferran Torres had put the hosts ahead in the 19th.
Yamal ended the match being shown a yellow card for a foul on Lucas Hernández.
PSG is the the first team to win three straight road games against Barcelona in major European competitions. Barcelona was looking to win its sixth consecutive match across all tournaments.
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