Messi, Neymar and Mbappe 'unimpressive' at PSG as Pochettino given warning

Lionel Messi, Sergio Ramos and Gianluigi Donnarumma all joined for nothing to complete their star-studded team.

Fans were salivating at the prospect of seeing Messi alongside Neymar and Kylian Mbappe in attack.

The trio have started two games together, and they have been underwhelming together.

Their midweek Champions League clash with Club Brugge ended in a 1-1 draw, with Ander Herrera scoring, while they needed a last-minute Mauro Icardi goal to beat Lyon on Sunday.

Manager Mauricio Pochettino even substituted Messi, which drew an angry stare from the Argentinian.

PSG have won all six of their Ligue 1 games so far this season, but that has far from told the full story.

Herrera is joint top scorer with Kylian Mbappe on four goals while Icardi has three and Idrissa Gueye has two.

Neymar got his first goal of the season against Lyon on Sunday, while Messi is yet to find the back of the net.

Assessing the front three at PSG so far, European football expert Andy Brassell told talkSPORT: "Kylian Mbappe hurt his foot not once, but twice in the game against Club Brugge in the Champions League earlier this week, which had been the first time the three of them played together.

"A lot of thinking people out there who wondered how Pochettino would blend that into his preferred style of pressing football, a lot of their fears were realised in that game in Belgium.

"It was not a good performance by Paris Saint-German, and on Sunday they got away with it as well."

He added: "These two games the big three have played have been really quite unimpressive performances from PSG.

"You could argue that Lyon were the slightly better team and played a very good match.

"Even with Paris improving a lot from that game in the week against Club Brugge, which was a really poor performance from them.

"Brugge had the chance to beat them and they've beaten good teams in the Champions League before and have won the Belgium league by a distance in the last couple of seasons.

"Nevertheless, they are the Belgium champions and not the champions of Germany or Spain and filled with a galaxy of superstars like Paris Saint-Germain are.

"That's the problem that Pochettino is faced with a situation where there is no excuses when you don't produce the performances and win."

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Pochettino will be under pressure to deliver both in Ligue 1 and the Champions League, having been beaten to the title by Lille last season.

Their next Champions League game will be against last year's runners-up Man City.

Brassell said: "Going back to the look from Messi, and the team selection of the last two games, it tells you what a tough job it is going to be for Pochettino fighting against nature and fighting really against the football he wants to play for a lot of the time."

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