PSG 0-1 Liverpool: Harvey Elliott proves the hero as sub nets late winner to snatch smash-and-grab win in the Champions League

A Beatles theme ran through the pages of France’s daily sports newspaper L’Equipe on Wednesday in honour of the visit of Liverpool. One of the headlines doubled as a plea to the vibrant, young PSG team assembled by Luis Enrique.

It was a plea to this side, which has finally started to play like a team rather than a collection of spoilt, over-indulged galacticos, not to be overawed by Arne Slot’s runaway Premier League leaders. ‘Hey Dudes,’ the headline read, ‘Don’t be Afraid.’

And PSG were not afraid. They threw themselves into this match with utter abandon. They tore into Liverpool in wave after wave of blue fury. They pressed them ferociously. Time after time, the brilliance of Ousmane Dembele and Khvicha Kvaratskhelia exposed their defence.

Liverpool may have had isolate awkward episodes this season – the furore at the end of Goodison’s last Merseyside derby and the FA Cup defeat at Plymouth come to mind – but they had not endured anything like this.

And yet they survived everything the young dudes could throw at them. Mainly, that was because of the serial brilliance of Liverpool goalkeeper Alisson, who made a string of superb saves to keep out close range efforts from Dembele and Bradley Barcola.

And then three minutes from the end of a match in which Liverpool had been battered and beaten and run ragged, the ball was laid out to substitute Harvey Elliott on the right of the PSG box and Gianluigi Donnarumma could only get a weak hand to it and it squirmed into the net and Liverpool had won.

PSG were entitled to feel the night had been brutally cruel to them. But if their nerve failed them anywhere, it was in their finishing. The brilliance of Alisson notwithstanding, they had chances they should have converted but when the big moments came, somehow they shrank away from them.

Liverpool did not. They got one chance and they took it. That is the team they have become. A brilliant team and an opportunist team. A team that waits. A team that digs in. A team that is ready when they need to be.

Liverpool rode their luck, too. They were fortunate that Ibrahima Konate was not sent off for a first half shove on Barcola and sometimes it felt, when Alisson’s saves pushed the ball back into play, that it would simply not fall for them.

But they survived. And they will walk out at Anfield next Tuesday with a one-goal lead, knowing that they escaped last night, knowing that they were distinctly second best against an outstanding team and that they can now be confident of progressing to a quarter-final that is likely to be against Aston Villa

There had seemed to be fewer Liverpool fans in the French capital than is usual before a match of this importance but then, given their experiences the last time the club played here, perhaps that should not be a surprise.

Football flirted dangerously with another crowd tragedy before the 2022 Champions League final between Liverpool and Real Madrid at the Stade de France when shambolic, incompetent French policing led to dangerous build-ups of fans at a bottle-neck on the way to the stadium and outside the turnstiles.

Some fans chose not to travel but those who did were at least spared the journey to the Stade de France, which seems to have become a trouble-spot for crowd control. Entry to the Parc des Princes did, at least, seem better organised.

There was, though, no ambiguity about the attitude to the game in Paris. As well as urging to PSG’s young team to be brave, L’Equipe turned its front page into a pastiche of the cover of Sgt.Pepper’s Lonely Hearts Club Band.

In place of The Beatles sign at the bottom of the picture, the slogan read The Battle. And at the centre of the image, L’Equipe’s Fab Four were Marquinhos, in-form striker Ousmane Dembele, Virgil van Dijk and Mo Salah.

Of those four, Dembele was the first to make an impact. The opening stages were cagey. The only problems Liverpool faced were problems they made for themselves when Van Dijk and Luis Diaz gave away possession.

But then, after a quarter of an hour, Dembele slipped the ball past Andy Robertson on the Liverpool left and then skipped past Alexis Mac Allister. Dembele laid the ball back to Joao Neves but he hit his shot into the ground and it bounced over the bar.

Liverpool had another escape a couple of minutes later. When they failed to clear a corner, it was played to Kvaratskhelia and he curled his shot round Ryan Gravenberch and past Alisson. The Parc des Princes erupted. Replays showed Kvaratskhelia had strayed offside in the build-up.

The stadium was in tumult. PSG wanted a red card when Ibrahima Konate shoved Bradley Barcola as he ran through in goal. VAR decided against it and the crescendo of boos was deafening. Liverpool were pushing their luck to the limit.

Then they pushed it some more. Barcola played Dembele, who had 25 goals in all competitions going into this game, including five in his last two Champions League games, clean through on goal but Alisson blocked his shot with his legs.

The ball rebounded to Barcola and when Dominik Szoboszlai threw himself in front of his first shot, Barcola had the goal at his mercy again. This time, he lifted it over the bar.

Liverpool had not been run ragged like this all season. Alisson had to get down sharply to keep about another low shot from Kvaratskhelia with his right hand and Liverpool were grateful for the half-time whistle.

Slot resisted the temptation to make changes at half time, although the temptation must have been strong. Normal service quickly resumed. Alisson flung himself full length to produce a brilliant one-handed save to keep out a free-kick from Kvaratskhelia.

Next, Liverpool survived a series of three vicious inswinging corners from Dembele. Szoboszlai kicked one of the line as it threatened to arrow into the net at the near post. PSG were relentless. The pressure came in wave after wave but still they could not break through.

And then, late in the game, Slot brought on Elliott. And before he had even touched the ball, Darwin Nunez broke through and laid the ball into his path and Elliott did the rest. And the dudes, who had not been afraid, hung their heads in despair.