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Paris Saint-Germain needed a penalty shootout to see off Olympique Lyonnais in the final of the Coupe de la Ligue on Friday, with Keylor Navas saving the crucial spot-kick from Bertrand Traore after a gruelling 120 minutes at the Stade de France.
With French football having been on a hiatus since mid-March, this was Lyon's first competitive match in over four months while their opponents were more in-tune following their 1-0 victory in the final of the Coupe de France just last week.
Despite the presence of stellar names in the PSG camp, Lyon were unfazed and gave as good as they got for over two hours of football. There were even large spells in the game when they put the Parisians on the backfoot.
After a slow start to the match, the first chance of the night fell to Lyon when Houssam Aouar found Bruno Guimaraes in space but the Brazil international disappointingly shot wide when he should have done better.
This was the same story for the rest of the match and a combination of dogged defending and poor finishing ensured that extra-time was needed to separate both sides.
With what was virtually the last kick of the game, Lyon full-back Rafael - a replacement for Leo Dubois in the 85th minute - cynically fouled PSG's Angel di Maria, who was through on goal. The referee had no option but to show the former Manchester United man his marching orders.
Neymar stepped up to take the ensuing free-kick but his effort failed to trouble the impressive Anthony Lopes, who ensured that spot-kicks would be needed to decide the winner of the Coupe de la Ligue.
Both PSG and Lyon had a 100% record in the first round of the shootout but Traore missed at the sixth time of asking, leaving Pablo Sarabia to convert the decisive spot-kick to give PSG her ninth League Cup title.
Here, we shall be highlighting five talking points from the PSG-Lyon fixture.
#5 Anonymous Icardi fails to take advantage
With Kylian Mbappe out injured and Edinson Cavani departed, the coast has been cleared for Mauro Icardi to stake a claim as PSG's main striker.
The Argentina international has not exactly made headlines since his loan move to France last summer and following his permanent signing in May, his performances would be further put under the scanner.
A common accusation levelled against Icardi right from his Inter Milan days is his propensity to not contribute to the overall play.
The 27-year-old demonstrated this tendency as he had a game to forget for PSG on Friday. He was given a start against Lyon but failed to make any meaningful impact and his numbers from the game make for pretty grim reading.
The former Sampdoria man failed to take a single shot while he had just nine touches throughout his time on the field. It came as no surprise when he was hauled off for Pablo Sarabia with just 58 minutes gone.
#4 Lyon fail to qualify for Europe for the first time in 27 years
The premature decision to end Ligue 1 because of the COVID-19 pandemic meant that the French football authorities had to come up with a system to decide the final standings.
A point-per-game system was ultimately adopted, with the average points taken in the 27 rounds of matches played used to determine the table.
This saw Lyon narrowly miss out on the European places, with a seventh-place finish not enough to secure a spot in the Europa League.
Another opportunity presented itself in the Coupe de la Ligue, with the winner set to secure a place in the second qualifying round of the Europa League. However, with their defeat to PSG, Les Gones would not participate in Europe for the first time since 1993.
#3 PSG continue domestic dominance
With the league and cup titles already wrapped up, Thomas Tuchel turned his attention to this clash with Lyon, with a victory here guaranteeing that PSG would have a clean sweep of domestic titles on offer this season.
This victory was the Parisian giants' ninth overall triumph in this competition and their seventh in eight years. It also wrapped up a domestic quadruple for the recently-concluded season.
The sheer difference in quality between PSG and the rest of the competition means that victory is all but guaranteed but this takes nothing away from their incredible performance.
#2 Vast improvement needed ahead of Champions League resumption
With Champions League football returning in less than a fortnight, both PSG and Lyon would need to up the ante by several notches if they are to make a mark in the latter stages of the competition.
While PSG are already through to the last eight, having eliminated Borussia Dortmund just before the suspension, Lyon still have their work cut out against Juventus, albeit with a slender one-goal advantage.
However, on the strength of their play tonight, neither PSG nor Lyon looked particularly convincing, with disjointed play, inaccurate passing and wayward finishing the order of the day.
With both Juventus and Atalanta having had one month of top-flight football under their belt, their French opponents need to improve majorly to get anything from the fixtures.
#1 Classy Neymar distinguishes himself
Fresh from his match-winning display in the victory over St Etienne last week, Neymar was back to his brilliant best in the clash with Lyon and was the best player on the field.
With the dogged and compact midfield of Lyon cutting off supply from him, the Brazil international seized the initiative and constantly dropped deep in a bid to make things happen.
The 28-year-old had seven shots in total (more than all his teammates combined), with three of those hitting the target. His five completed dribbles were also the most on the night, while he constantly sliced the Lyon defence open with killer through balls, including one for which Rafael got sent off.
A goal would have capped up a fine performance but in this form, Neymar is almost unplayable and his manager and fans would hope he can keep it going to fire them to glory on the continent.
