PARIS — Imagine being one of the top two teams in your domestic league — being better by far than anyone else in your country apart from your archrivals. This other team who shares with you a similar budget, a squad similarly constructed of international players from France, the U.S., Germany or other top football nations, great staffs and facilities.
You are one of these two clubs, but you are frequently the losers in this historic rivalry. You’re dominated more than you are dominant, playing catch-up in your head-to-heads and almost always losing the big games against them.
This is the story of Paris Saint-Germain, who again suffered a harsh reality check in the UEFA Women’s Champions League on Sunday. Lyon, the other member of this two-step waltz, knocked them out of the competition after a 2-1 win at the Parc des Princes in the semifinal second leg, a 5-3 win on aggregate.
Yet again. Just like in 2022 and 2020 in the semifinals, or in 2017 in the final, it is Lyon who continually gets the best in…
