PSG 5-4 Bayern: History at the Parc.

The record books, cracked open

This is now the highest-scoring semi-final in European Cup history, level with Rangers 3-6 Eintracht Frankfurt in 1960. Let that settle. A game played in 1960, when the competition was seven years old, has held that record for sixty-five years — and it took a Khvicha Kvaratskhelia-shaped wrecking ball to match it.

The tone was set inside seventeen minutes. Harry Kane converted a penalty to put Bayern ahead, calm as you like, and for a moment it looked like Luis Enrique's side might be in for a long evening. They weren't. João Neves headed in from a Ousmane Dembélé corner just past the half-hour, and Dembélé — who seemed to be everywhere — made it two. Kane's response was to keep doing Kane things, but it was Dayot Upamecano who levelled with a header from a Joshua Kimmich free-kick, before Luis Díaz curled one in from the far post to make it 3-2 to Bayern going into the break. Except it wasn't 3-2 to Bayern going into the break. Dembélé won and converted a stoppage-time penalty, and PSG went in at 3-2 up instead. The Parc lost its mind.

143 seconds that ended the argument

If the first half was chaotic, the second opened with something close to decisive. Fifty-eight minutes in, PSG scored twice in two minutes and twenty-three seconds. Kvaratskhelia first — the Georgian does not so much beat defenders as make them question their career choices — then Dembélé again, his second of the night. Five-two. The tie, on paper at least, was over.

Bayern had other ideas, as Bayern tend to. They pulled two back late to make it 5-4, and suddenly the second leg at the Allianz Arena looks like exactly the kind of game that will require a cardiologist on standby. Kvaratskhelia finished with two goals. Dembélé finished with two goals and an assist. Between them they produced the kind of performance that reminds you why this competition still matters.

What comes next

PSG hold a one-goal advantage heading to Munich, which sounds comfortable until you remember they just conceded four at home. Vincent Kompany's Bayern are not done — they never are — and the Allianz Arena at European night volume is not a place PSG have historically enjoyed. But Luis Enrique's side have something this season that previous PSG vintage years lacked: they look like they actually want to defend when it matters, and they have the attacking depth to outscore almost anyone on a given night.

Almost anyone. Bayern just scored four at the Parc des Princes and still lost. This tie is nowhere near finished.