Soccer Football - UEFA Champions League - Bayer Leverkusen v Paris St Germain - BayArena, Leverkusen, Germany - October 21, 2025 Paris St Germain's Desire Doue celebrates scoring their fourth goal REUTERS/Thilo Schmuelgen
LEVERKUSEN, Germany (Reuters) -Holders Paris St Germain scored three times in seven minutes at the end of a rollercoaster first half on the way to crushing hosts Bayer Leverkusen 7-2 in the Champions League on Tuesday, after both teams played with 10 men for almostan hour.
Desire Doue scored twice for the French side who earned a club record-equalling sixth consecutive win in the Champions League, including last season,and top the league phase table after three matches with a maximum nine points.
PSG, whose Ballon d'Or winner Ousmane Dembele scored in a fairytale comeback from injury, were unstoppable in the first half and snapped Leverkusen's nine-match unbeaten run at home against European opponents.
"The feeling is very positive because we played very well," PSG coach Luis Enrique said. "We had clear chances and we deserved the victory."
"It was a bit strange because with the player sent off, it became a different game with ten players against ten. It is difficult to play away. There are many things you cannot control but we did our homework, as usual. We are proud of this team."
PSG TAKE EARLY LEAD
The visitors took a seventh-minute lead through Willian Pacho's far-post header. Leverkusen, who found themselves on the back foot from the start, had the chance to level with Alejandro Grimaldo's 25th-minute penalty but the Spaniard hit the post.
It got worse for the hosts when captain Robert Andrich was sent off for elbowing Desire Doue in the 32nd minute. PSG then also went down to 10 men as Illia Zabarnyi felled Christian Kofane to give Leverkusen another spot-kick.
Aleix Garcia equalised but the home side's joy only lasted three minutes, with Doue putting the visitors back in front as huge gaps started to appear in the Leverkusen defence following Andrich's dismissal.
Khvicha Kvaratskhelia made it 3-1 with a precise shot off the post a minute before the break with the hosts in complete disarray and Doue netted his second to virtually ensure a third straight win in the competition for PSG this season.
Nuno Mendes slotted home to make it 5-1 in the 50th minute before Garcia pulled a goal back four minutes later, but Dembele scored in the 66th with an easy tap-in only minutes after coming on and Vitinha completed the rout in the 90th.
"We are feeling a lot of pain right now," Leverkusen coach Kasper Hjulmand told a press conference. "It is big numbers and professionally we are hurt. It is not a good feeling.
"The decisive minutes were those seven minutes. We lost the game in these seven minutes. Going from 1-1 in those seven minutes ... it's a big difference, 4-1. Game over."
Leverkusen, who are 27th in the 36-team Champions League table with two points from three games, next travel to Benfica on November 5 after PSG host Bayern Munich the previous day.
(Reporting by Karolos Grohmann, editing by Ed Osmond and Ken Ferris)
