Champions League: PSG Humiliate Real Madrid

Angel di Maria scored twice as Paris St-Germain punished Real Madrid 3-0 in their Champions League Group A opener on Wednesday at the Parc de France.

Thomas Meunier later completed the trashing of the former European champions on a night they would love to quickly forget.

Real manager Zinedine Zidane, whose win ratio is below 50% since returning to the club towards the end of last season, started Eden Hazard – his first start for the visitors.

Celebrating his 100th goal in the competition, Di Maria opened the scoring with a close-range shot that crept inside Thibaut Courtois’ near post from Juan Bernat’s pass.

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While Real’s Belgian goalkeeper Courtois appeared to be caught out for the opening goal, he could do nothing to prevent the second.

Idrissa Gueye’s fine work on the right create the opening for Di Maria and the Argentina winger found the bottom right corner superbly with a curling effort from 20 yards.

Hopes of a Real fight-back were briefly raised when Gareth Bale lobbed the ball magnificently over home keeper Keylor Navas from the edge of the penalty area.

However, his goal was ruled out for handball by referee Anthony Taylor after it was reviewed by video assistant referee (VAR) officials, as was Karim Benzema’s offside effort late in the second period.

It ensured that PSG, who were without their entire first-choice strike force of Neymar, Edinson Cavani and Kylian Mbappe, halted a run of three consecutive defeats against the Spanish club.