Ousmane Dembele recently scored the goal that drew PSG level with Liverpool in their two-legged UEFA Champions League last 16 tie. The French ace also converted his penalty in the eventual shootout and enjoyed a very good game in general, threatening Liverpool’s defence with his pace and trickery.
His goal was nothing more than a tap-in in the end but it was a fine run into the box that caused the chaos that led to the opening and his predatory instincts meant he was in the right place at the right time. Dembele has been around for a long time now but finally seems to be settling in at PSG and really enjoying his football, something that he perhaps hasn’t done since the early days of his career.
There are, of course, many players across Europe enjoying brilliant seasons. Mo Salah’s chances of challenging for the Ballon d’Or have probably vanished due to Liverpool’s early exit from the Champions League but he is sure to break a number of Premier League records this term. Harry Kane, Robert Lewandowski, Viktor Gyokeres, Alexander Isak and, dare we forget, Erling Haaland, are all scoring freely.
But if we consider form and goals from December last year onwards alone, there is one player that puts all those greats in the shade, and that is PSG ace Dembele. He is currently enjoying the hottest of hot goalscoring streaks and is in, quite easily, the form of his life. His team are going to romp to the Ligue 1 title but if he can keep up his current form, they will also take some stopping in the Champions League too.
Dembele’s Hot Streak
The former Borussia Dortmund man joined the Parisians in August 2023 for a fee of around €50m. In his first campaign with the club he helped them win the domestic league and cup double, though it would be fair to say he did not play a huge role in things. He made 42 appearances in all competitions but found the back of the net just six times. That included three goals in 26 league matches.
The French international, who boasts 53 senior caps for his nation and has netted six goals for Les Bleus, did not exactly start the 2024/25 campaign in fine fettle either. He often played well, but the end product, as has been the case throughout much of his career, was not there as often as his coaches would have liked.
In the first 13 league matches of the season, for example, he scored just five goals, although in fairness he played less than half an hour in a number of those games. However, since the 15th of December, Dembele has turned into a goalscoring machine and is, without doubt, the most in-form striker in world football.
In the whole of the current campaign he boasts 29 goals from 36 matches, that tally already more than double what he has ever managed previously in a whole season. But with the majority of those goals coming since mid-December, in less than three months, Dembele is scoring for fun at the moment.
Part of the reason for the transformation is that the tricky attacker has been used increasingly through the middle, rather than in his more traditional position wide on the right. But that is not everything though, as even when he has played on the right of a front three he has still been banging in the goals of late. He is now playing with the swagger and confidence he showed early in his career, before injuries and his huge price tag at Barca took some of that away from him.
He netted early on in a 3-1 win against Lyon on the 15th of December last year and has not looked back since then. Three days later he bagged a brace against Monaco, scoring against the same opposition on the 5th of January in the French Super Cup. That strike was the only goal of the game and brought more silverware to PSG.
Fears that this new-found scoring form was a mere flash in the pan were well and truly laid to rest as Dembele then went on an even more impressive scoring spree. His form for the whole of 2025, including that Super Cup clash with Monaco and up to the Champions League match with Liverpool, can be seen below:
| Date | Opponent | Goals | Mins Played |
|---|---|---|---|
| 5/1/25 | Monaco | 1 | 90 |
| 12/1/25 | Saint-Etienne | 2 | 90 |
| 22/1/25 | Man City | 1 | 45 |
| 25/1/25 | Reims | 1 | 60 |
| 29/1/25 | VfB Stuttgart | 3 | 90 |
| 1/2/25 | Brest | 3 | 67 |
| 7/2/25 | Monaco | 2 | 90 |
| 11/2/25 | Brest | 2 | 82 |
| 15/2/25 | Toulouse | 0 | 27 |
| 19/2/25 | Brest | 0 | 60 |
| 23/2/25 | Lyon | 1 | 74 |
| 26/2/25 | Stade Briochin | 1 | 28 |
| 1/3/25 | Lille | 1 | 63 |
| 5/3/25 | Liverpool | 0 | 90 |
| 8/3/25 | Rennes | 2 | 26 |
| 11/3/25 | Liverpool | 1 | 120 |
| Total | 16 Games | 21 | 1,102 |
That is a truly staggering run of goalscoring, with a few assists sprinkled in along the way too. Netting 21 goals from 16 games is the sort of output we have only really seen before in any sort of sustained way from players Lionel Messi or Cristiano Ronaldo. He has averaged a goal every 52 minutes in that time, with most of the games taking place in either the French top flight or the Champions League (two each against Liverpool and Brest, plus one each against Man City and Stuttgart).
As impressive as those numbers are, he was even more productive in the first eight games of the year, netting in eight in a row. He bagged 15 goals in that time and PSG will be desperate to keep him fit until the end of the campaign.
What Next for PSG and Dembele?
As things stand Dembele’s side are a whopping 16 points clear at the top of Ligue 1 and the title will be theirs sooner rather than later. With just nine league games to go, they only need 12 more points to be absolutely certain of the title and so they will have the luxury of resting players for the CL if they so choose.
That might hinder Dembele in his race to catch Salah in terms of the race for the European Golden Boot, which is already tough due to the extra four games played in the Premier League. However, it does mean he should be fit, fresh and ready to go for PSG’s quarter-final clash, most probably against Aston Villa.
The famous Parisian club have never won the UEFA Champions League (or the European Cup) but this season may well be their best shot. The likes of Barca, Bayern, Inter, Real if they get past Atletico, and Arsenal, would all be formidable opponents, but Enrique’s men look like they may just be the best side left … especially if their French attacker maintains his hot streak until the 31st of May.