Ancelotti has puzzle to assemble at PSG

At the end of a topsy-turvy year in the colorful history of Paris Saint-Germain - a fascinating period concluded by the arrival of Carlo Ancelotti - the club's future is still replete with questions. The shock of a stratospherically augmented budget, following Qatar Sports Investment’s (QSI) arrival as majority shareholder, has died down, but the organizational reality of conquering even the domestic landscape is still drifting in and out of focus.

Carlo Ancelotti was unveiled as new coach on December 30, just in time for the transfer window. (AP Photo/Jacques Brinon)

The will-he-won't-he regarding the possible attendance of imminent arrival David Beckham at PSG's last home match of 2011 may have been the bottom line for an international audience, but not in Paris. Ligue 1, unconquered by the Parisians since 1994, was the priority, and a partisan, sold-out Parc des Princes was keen to celebrate its side’s return to being a genuine challenger against Lille.

Instead, PSG's status as a work-in-progress was laid bare as it labored to a goalless draw against the national champion. When QSI's representative in Paris, Nasser Al-Khelaifi, filed past the assembled press pack at the end of the match, he wore a face like thunder. His expensively-assembled team having a mere 42% of possession - and playing on the counter - at home in the biggest match of the season was most certainly not what he expected.

The tension in the corridors of the Parc was palpable and never more personified than in the shape of the figure intended as the chef de cuisine. Javier Pastore was the next to exit after the boss and flat-palmed the most tentative of enquiries to talk. "No," he said, looking straight ahead and marching on with considerably more certainty than he has shown on the pitch in recent weeks.

As sporting director Leonardo’s hand-picked, €43m ($56.5m) jewel in the crown, Pastore was bought from Palermo to truly stellify a strong-looking team. He started at express pace, but has dropped off alarmingly. His total of six goals and two assists in Ligue 1 has remained frozen since he scored the clincher in the 4-2 defeat of Caen on October 29.

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Many wondered how El Flaco ('the skinny one') would adapt to the particularly physical rigors of French soccer, and if normal rules appeared initially not to apply to someone of such uncommon talent, Pastore has appeared wan of late. His comments in conversation to his mentor, Angel Cappa, in an interview in So Foot magazine may have sharpened the perception of a frustrated figure (Pastore complained of lacking "freedom" in his role and that "in France, they play with their heads down"), but it is an unavoidable conclusion.

When Pastore and Kevin Gameiro were both substituted in the 3-0 defeat at Marseille on November 27, Gameiro kicked a drinks bottle and slapped the bench. Pastore just sloped disconsolately to find a coat and sat staring into space. When hooked for defender Sylvain Armand against Lille, the playmaker again trudged to the bench, the epitome of flat-footed deflation. For the first time, boos from the stands were directed at Pastore.

The context may have been particularly painful, with Eden Hazard at the hub of Lille’s play, even on a relatively quiet night. It’s no secret that PSG was prepared to go all the way to capture Hazard this summer who, in many ways, would have been a far more logical mega-signing. At the end of the game, the Belgian’s white strip was covered in mud and dirt, a memento of a dogged presence that just won’'t quit, even when the conditions don’t suit. The stats later showed that Hazard made twice as many passes – and tackles – as Pastore, despite playing in a wider position.

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It’s an unfair comparison in some ways. The pair are completely different beasts, and Hazard is fully acclimatized to the French game, having arrived at Lille's academy as a 14-year-old. Likewise, Pastore’s teammate Jeremy Menez is much more of a creative leader at the moment. It isn’t just the former Roma man’s furry blond mohawk that gives him the air of a mechanical hare at a greyhound track. He, like the 30-year-old Nene, demonstrates a turn of speed that seems beyond Pastore, though the Brazilian winger offers a suggestion of how his fellow South American might adapt.

At the moment, Pastore looks absolutely bewildered as he drifts ridiculously far forward, lost, almost as the second striker in a 4-4-2 and expected to get a flick-on to punts forward by Ceara and Christophe Jallet. If the L’Equipe debate measured Pastore against Hazard, the former may well have instead cocked an envious eye towards Lille’s Joe Cole, the nearest English soccer’s current generation has to a genuine #10, roving from one side of the pitch to the other.

Speaking to FOX Soccer after the match, Cole was characteristically charitable. “I know he’s a big talent but he’s a young man, and it’ll take time after moving from Italy and from another league. You see it in the Premier League; some take one year to settle, some take two years. He’s doing well and he’s a good player.”

Whereas Hazard and Cole have found kindred spirits in each other, Pastore is isolated. The difficulties were always there, but the sheer brilliance of his initial moments of impact – creating the late goals that earned a dramatic first away win of the season at Toulouse, his stunning individual goal to smash open Lyon - masked his teething troubles. He is no more useless today than he was the second coming of Just Fontaine three months ago.

In this way, Pastore is a microcosm of PSG’s progress so far in the QSI era. The individual quality at its disposal is such that the team was often able to mask Antoine Kombouaré’s difficulties in assimilating new stars into a previously solid unit capable of producing decisive moments at the right times. Kombouaré’s inability to conjure cohesion out of thin air likely contributed to him being dispatched from his post, despite the fact that PSG recovered from the Lille stalemate to head into the winter break sitting at the summit of Ligue 1, three points clear of Montpellier and ahead of last season’s champion's pace.

PSG recovered from its stalemate with Lille to beat Saint-Etienne and top the table going into the winter break. (Laurent Cipriani/AP Photo)

“It’s not bad,” shrugged defender Milan Bisevac when asked by FOX Soccer for his opinions on PSG’s first half of the season, his coy grin briefly opening a window to the ridiculousness of the change in PSG’s circumstances – and expectations. “It’s all about the collective, of course. But we’re at the top, and we’re there or thereabouts.”

Lille, though, showed that PSG's glitter is beginning to fade and the new bogeyman of France is losing its fear factor. “You don’t play against the names,” said Lille’s Aurélien Chedjou. “You just play eleven other players on the pitch.”

More than splashing QSI’s cash in the quest for world domination, that is the new coach’s most immediate task as PSG enters 2012 and the Ancelotti era; moulding an ever-expanding collection of talented individuals into a cohesive unit, capable of fending off the stubborn challenges of Lille, Lyon and Montpellier at the top of Ligue 1.