Luis Enrique believes Paris Saint-Germain have improved defensively compared to last season, as they attempt to defend their Champions League trophy.

PSG will face Arsenal in European club football's flagship match in Budapest on Saturday, when they could join a very exclusive club.

Real Madrid are the only team to defend the Champions League trophy since the competition's 1992-93 rebrand, winning it three times in a row between 2015-16 and 2017-18.

Luis Enrique's side are the first to reach consecutive Champions League finals since Liverpool in 2018 and 2019, while PSG's three finals since 2020 are the most of any club.

While PSG are renowned for their free-flowing attacking style and Arsenal have reached the final off the back of a fearsome defensive record, Luis Enrique believes his team have also improved in the latter department this term.

That is despite them keeping fewer clean sheets (five) and conceding more goals (22) in 16 Champions League games in 2025-26, when compared to 2024-25 (seven clean sheets, 15 goals against in 17 matches).

"I think we can do many more things than last year, but we did it because [our opponents] have obliged us to do it," Luis Enrique said in an interview with TNT Sports.

"We prefer to get the ball, we prefer to keep the ball, but when you have to adapt because the other side is better than you during moments of the match, you have to adapt, and you have to defend even better. I think we did that clearly.

"We defended much better against Chelsea than we did in the final of the Club World Cup. We defended better against Liverpool, and we did the same against Bayern Munich. We defended much better in the second match [1-1] than the first one [5-4].

"We can still improve, but that doesn't mean that we don't want to keep the ball and try to play with the same idea, but we're now much more powerful in defence."

PSG shipped five goals in a remarkable semi-final tie against Bayern Munich, prevailing 6-5 on aggregate, though they shut Liverpool out 4-0 in the previous round and beat Chelsea 8-2 across two legs in the last 16.

Per game, PSG have faced marginally more expected goals (1.4 xG to 1.1), shots (10.6 to 10.1) and shots on target (4.2 to 3.5) in this season's Champions League than they did last term, though it should be noted that they also faced Barcelona and Bayern Munich in a tough league-phase draw.

At the time of the league-phase draw last August, the Opta Power Rankings determined that PSG had the second-toughest set of Champions League fixtures, after Bayern.

Remarking on Arsenal's defence, Luis Enrique added: "Their stats are amazing. 

"Everybody knows that they are very strong without the ball, but they score a lot of goals, they use set-pieces and the things that they dominate.

"That's a very nice combination for a team. That's why they haven't lost a single match in the Champions League.

"We are trying to overcome them in the final and try to play the best way we can. I think it's going to be a nice final."