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Football

23rd Aug 2020

Streets of Marseille erupt in celebration as PSG lose Champions League final

Marseille fans took to the streets to celebrate their long time rivals losing the Champions League final against Bayern Munich

Reuben Pinder

Siri, define schadenfreude

Paris Saint-Germain lost 1-0 to Bayern Munich in the Champions League final on Sunday night in an enthralling game that could have gone either way.

PSG, like Bayern, are not very popular outside of Paris. While their growing dominance will inevitably lead to their fanbase expanding, they are still very much reviled by fans of Marseille, Lyon and France’s other more traditional big clubs.

Marseille are their oldest rivals and the other half of ‘Le Classique’, and the whole city was rooting for Bayern Munich on the night, to the extent that they took to the streets to celebrate the result of a game their team was not involved in.

Videos have been posted to Twitter of fans lining the streets, singing songs and setting off fireworks as the whole town indulged in the purest form of schadenfreude.

Journalist Jean Saint-Marc writes below that the Marseille locals are running through the streets singing “where are Parisiens?”

https://twitter.com/OlympikManifiq/status/1297643496745172999

On the one hand, this is incredibly tinpot. Marseille weren’t even in the competition.

On the other, it’s very understandable to revel in your rival’s misery like this given the way PSG’s rise has been funded by a petro-state with a dubious human rights record. For all the millions spent by PSG’s Qatari owners, seeing them fall at the final hurdle is going to be incredibly satisfying for Marseille fans.

Crack on lads.