The hotel where Barcelona are staying in the French capital Paris witnessed, during the early hours of this Tuesday morning, a number of Paris Saint-Germain fans setting off fireworks, in an attempt to disturb the Catalan side's players and deprive them of rest ahead of the eagerly awaited meeting between the two teams.
According to the Spanish newspaper "Sport", Barcelona visit Paris Saint-Germain today, Tuesday, in a match Hansi Flick described as "a good test to find out where we currently stand".
The Parc des Princes hosts one of the finest fixtures in world football right now. The season may still be in its early stages, but both sides have delivered the best standards and impressions since it began.
Neither Barcelona nor Paris Saint-Germain are under great pressure in the standings, so no result tonight will prove decisive. Yet the atmosphere carries an exceptional European flavour, closer to the knockout nights of March and April than a mid-October evening.
PSG's fans know exactly what this encounter means, and they have already begun to play their part for Luis Enrique's team.
Convinced that any move, however simple, could help bring down the Catalans, a number of them headed in the early hours to Barcelona's hotel, the Domaine de Reine Margot Paris, to disturb the blaugrana players.
José Álvarez, correspondent for the programme "El Chiringuito", spotted several PSG supporters after 1:15am, setting off fireworks to stop the Barcelona delegation getting enough rest.
It is a familiar routine in the French capital before big Champions League nights, designed to intimidate opponents and rattle them before kick-off.
Curfew restrictions imposed in the Place de la République and the Les Halles area, following the unrest of recent days during the yellow vests protests against Emmanuel Macron's government, did not cover the district where Barcelona's hotel stands. That gave PSG's fans the freedom to carry out a practice spreading ever wider across Europe.
Whatever happens, Barcelona will face a fiercely hostile Parc des Princes. That only adds to the difficulty of a task that was already strong and complex.
Flick's side want to topple the holders of the last two Champions League editions, sending a strong message and proving their abilities ahead of the eagerly awaited Clásico at the end of next week.