MUNICH — Paris Saint-Germain won their first Champions League title Saturday with a 5-0 demolition of Inter Milan — the biggest winning margin in the final of the competition dating to 1956 — and sealed a treble after already winning Ligue 1 and the Coupe de France.
Achraf Hakimi’s 12th-minute opener against his former club and two goals from 19-year-old forward Désiré Doué — who became the first teenager to score twice in a final since Benfica’s Eusebio in a 5-3 win against Real Madrid in 1962 — put PSG in firm control before Khvicha Kvaratskhelia and substitute Senny Mayulu capped the French champions’ historic victory.
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The Qatari-owned PSG had spent over a decade trying to win the Champions League by signing the world’s biggest stars, including Lionel Messi, Neymar, Zlatan Ibrahimovic and Kylian Mbappé.
But after abandoning that policy two years ago in favor of signing young players, PSG have now become champions of Europe — ironically in their first season without Mbappé, who moved to Real Madrid last summer with the intention of winning the Champions League.
PSG’s win makes them only the second French club to lift the European Cup, after Marseille in 1993, and coach Luis Enrique made it his second success after guiding Barcelona to victory in 2015.
“We have made history, we have written our names in the history of this club,” Hakimi said. “For a long time this club deserved it, we are very happy. We have created a great family.
“He [Luis Enrique] is the man who has changed everything at PSG. Since he came here, he has changed the way football is seen. He is a loyal man; he deserves it more than anyone else.”
Allianz Arena, the home of Bayern Munich, one of the titans of Europe, was a fitting stage for PSG’s crowning moment. Not least because it was against Bayern that PSG lost their only other Champions League final in 2020, leaving Neymar in tears in an empty stadium in Lisbon, where fans were locked out because of the pandemic.
On this occasion, thousands of PSG supporters were there to revel in the moment, waving flags, lighting flares and drowning out their rivals from Inter, many of whose supporters left the stadium long before the final whistle.
“It’s a mix of joy, of all the emotions we’ve spent together,” PSG defender Marquinhos said. “I’ve suffered, but I’ve grown up with this team. I think of all the players who have come through and not succeeded. My idol Thiago [Silva], Lucas, Zlatan, [Edinson] Cavani, [Angel] Di Maria.
“So many players who have come through here who deserved this and didn’t succeed. Now we’re here and we’re bringing it home. I’m thinking of all the supporters who have been with us, those at the Parc des Princes and those around the world. I love you, enjoy it and we’re going to enjoy it here. This is the best day of my life.”
PSG went ahead with the earliest goal in a Champions League final since 2019 with a move of speed and precision when Vitinha’s threaded pass into the box found the feet of Doué. The forward could have shot but instead slid in Hakimi to tap into an open net.
Former Inter player Hakimi’s celebrations were muted, but PSG’s fans erupted.
Eight minutes later and the lead was doubled — though this time it relied more on luck than precision as Doué’s shot from the right of the box deflected off Federico Dimarco and past Inter goalkeeper Yann Sommer.
He got his second in the 63rd, sliding the ball into the bottom corner when through on goal.
“I have no words. That was just incredible for me, simply incredible,” Doué said. “I have no words, sorry.”
Kvaratskhelia added a fourth 10 minutes later, and Mayulu then found the back of the net in the 86th, just two minutes after coming on to add his name to the list of teenage scorers in a final.
The fifth goal made it the most one-sided win in the final of Europe’s top competition, surpassing 4-0 victories for Inter’s city rivals AC Milan in 1994 and 1989 and a win by the same margin by Bayern Munich in 1974.
Information from The Associated Press and Reuters was used in this report.
