PSG's injury nightmare just got worse

Kvaratskhelia went down awkwardly after twisting the knee and was withdrawn shortly before the hour mark, with PSG's medical staff later confirming the ACL rupture, according to the BBC. The Guardian describes it as the most serious of three fresh injury concerns to come out of the win over Barcelona, with Ousmane Dembélé and Marquinhos also sidelined.

An ACL tear of this kind typically rules a player out for six to nine months, which puts Kvaratskhelia's season in serious jeopardy and threatens his involvement deep into the Champions League campaign regardless of how far Luis Enrique's side go. For a player who has been among PSG's most important attackers this season, it is a brutal blow barely three months into the new campaign.

A squad already stretched thin

PSG sit second in Ligue 1 on 14 points from seven games, with four wins, two draws and one defeat and a goal difference of plus five, so the league form is not the issue. The issue is depth, and specifically depth in the final third, where Kvaratskhelia, Dembélé and Marquinhos going down in the same week leaves Luis Enrique short of options in three different areas of the pitch at once.

Marquinhos' absence is a defensive problem as much as an attacking one, given his importance to PSG's backline and his standing as a dressing-room leader. Dembélé's situation adds another body to the treatment table in an attack that was already about to lose its most in-form wide player for the best part of a year.

What it means for the Georgia international

Kvaratskhelia has 50 caps and 23 goals for Georgia, and his club form before the injury had made him one of the more watchable attackers in Europe. Surgery is the next step, with no return date confirmed, and PSG now face the rest of this Champions League campaign and a congested domestic calendar without one of their most dangerous forwards.

The win over Barcelona keeps PSG moving in the competition they care most about this season. The cost of it is starting to look considerably higher than four points.