Mauricio Pochettino believes PSG are still suffering from Real Madrid collapse

Mauricio Pochettino has admitted that Paris Saint-Germain's 3-0 defeat to Monaco was 'unacceptable' and that his side are still trying to get over their Champions League loss to Real Madrid.

PSG's opponents began the game 24 points behind the Ligue 1 leaders but that apparent gulf in class was not present on the pitch on Sunday. Pochettino's men were sloppy throughout and slipped to a fourth defeat of the season.

After the match, Pochettino pulled no punches, confessing that the display had not been anywhere near good enough from his expensively-assembled side.

"I'm disappointed with how we started the game. This is unacceptable. At this level of competition, you can't start a match like we did," he said.

"We can be happy to be 1-0 at half-time, because it could have been 2 or 3-0 already. In the second half, it was better, we created chances there, but our first half penalised us. I think it's really not acceptable to start a game the way we did."

The result comes just over a week after PSG crashed out of the Champions League lead at the hands of Real Madrid. They let a two-goal cushion slip in the second half of the return leg and their latest failure in Europe has attracted angry protests from the club's ultras.

Pochettino went on to reveal his belief that the Real result had had a profound effect on his players.

“It is clear that what happened in the Champions League did a lot of harm. The team clearly needs to break free from this," he said.

"This prevents us from expressing our best performance. This international break should allow us to change the mentality and put us back in place. We have to come back to the game with this responsibility that exists by wearing this shirt."

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