PROFILE | Vitinha is filling Marco Verratti-shaped hole as PSG’s midfield leader | OneFootball

Out of Paris Saint-Germain’s host of Jorge Mendes-backed signings over the last few years, the Portuguese international is by some distance the arrival who has had the biggest impact.

After a patchy first season, Vitinha’s presence in an ever-changing Paris Saint-Germain midfield has offered some much-needed continuity and stability. While not an exact Marco Verratti replacement stylistically speaking, the former Porto man has emerged as a similarly crucial presence in driving the team’s attacks forward, both in his incisive passing and in moving up the pitch himself.

Vitinha is usually deployed as a left-sided central midfielder, which sees him provide cover and combine with Kylian Mbappé down that flank. Luis Enrique has, on occasion, played him as the more defensive-minded of the midfield three, seeking to make the most of his press-resistant play – an element in which Manuel Ugarte has been lacking. When played higher up the pitch, Vitinha is particularly judicious in his own attempts to press and has been prolific in terms of recoveries in the attacking third.

Vitinha unleashed by Luis Enrique

With five goals so far, the midfielder is also 7th in Ligue 1’s scoring charts (admittedly more of a reflection of the league’s dearth of goals this year, but impressive from Vitinha nonetheless). The fact that he has already more than doubled his best-ever tally for a campaign is also indicative of a newfound confidence, even if it’s not his primary task. This year, Vitinha does not hesitate to let rip from range – often to great effect. It’s a stark contrast to last season’s hesitant approach, which was best exemplified in his failure to convert an open-goal chance against Bayern Munich in the Champions League Round of 16 second leg.

His reliability does translate into a hesitant and conservative approach in his passing choices, though. Unlike Verratti in his heyday, Vitinha tends to opt for the path of least resistance when it comes to finding his teammates during attacks – not that a more adventurous pass is beyond his talents, though, as his pre-assist for Ousmane Dembélé in the Trophée des Champions showed.

Whether Luis Enrique is afforded more time than his predecessors remains to be seen, but in any case, it’s evident that Vitinha has been one of the main beneficiaries of the Spaniard’s arrival on the bench. The 23-year-old’s versatility and consistency have seen him become a fixture of the new-look PSG.

GFFN | Raphaël Jucobin