Women's Champions League preview: WFC Kharkiv vs Paris Saint-Germain

WFC Kharkiv need a win to maintain their hopes of qualifying from Group B but are up against a Paris Saint-Germain side who have already secured first place and are yet to concede.

• The Ukrainian club secured their first Group B victory last time out, winning 2-0 away to Breidablik thanks to strikes from Yuliia Shevchuk – Kharkiv's maiden group stage goal – and Olha Ovdiychuk.

• Kharkiv lost their opening two Group B matches, 1-0 at home to Real Madrid on Matchday 1 and 5-0 against Paris in the French capital on 13 October. Jordyn Huitema (25, 32, 42) scored the first ever group hat-trick before Paulina Dudek (59) and Lea Khelifi (88) rounded off the scoring.

• Kharkiv, who will be unable to finish in the top two if they do not win and Madrid triumph at Breidablik, recorded successive clean sheets against the Icelandic club, drawing 0-0 at home on Matchday 3 before their first win last time out.

• Paris, who followed holders Barcelona to become the second club to reach the quarter-finals with a 2-0 win in Madrid on Matchday 4, are the only team to have secured first place in their group.

• Didier Ollé-Nicolle's team and Barcelona are the only sides to have won all four group matches, Paris registering 13 goals along the way – a tally only betted by Barcelona's tally of 15.

Ones to watch: Kharkiv

Olha Ovdiychuk
• The 27-year-old provided an assist and a deft finish – voted the Goal of the Week – in the 2-0 Matchday 4 success at Breidablik.

• The forward is Kharkiv's leading European scorer this term on six goals, having struck in all four qualifiers.

• Ovdiychuk clinched her seventh Ukrainian title with Kharkiv in 2020/21, to go with the six she collected in the space of seven years before leaving to play in the Primera División in 2019.

• The Ukrainian international has been the top scorer in the Ukrainian Women's League on four occasions, the last when she hit 30 goals in 2018/19.

Yuliia Shevchuk
• The 23-year-old scored Kharkiv's first Group B goal at Breidablik on Matchday 4, her neat finish also the 100th strike of the inaugural group stage.

• The midfielder has started all eight of her side's European matches this term, including qualifying, and opened the scoring in their qualifying campaign in the 5-1 Round 1 success against NSA of Bulgaria.

• Shevchuk has been with Kharkiv since 2016, having joined from WFC Rodyna Kostopil.

• The Ukrainian international featured in both of their recent FIFA Women's World Cup qualifiers, starting the 4-2 defeat in Hungary on 30 November having come on in the 1-1 draw in Scotland four days earlier.

Birgül Sadıkoğlu
• The 21-year-old has registered a club-high four attempts on target in the group stage, only Ovdiychuk (seven) mustering more shots than her six.

• Sadıkoğlu has started all eight of the Kharkiv's UEFA Women's Champions League matches so far this term, scoring in the 4-1 win against Pomurje Beltinci on 21 August.

• The attacker joined in February this year after seven seasons in the Turkish league.

• The Turkish international scored her country's first goal as they came back from two down to beat Israel 3-2 in FIFA Women's World Cup qualifying on 30 November.

Ones to watch: Paris

Jordyn Huitema
• The 20-year-old scored the first ever UEFA Women's Champions League group stage hat-trick in the space of 17 first-half minutes against Kharkiv on Matchday 2.

• The forward has scored nine goals in 14 European appearances, finding the net on each of her last four starts for a total of seven goals in those four matches.

• Huitema scored five goals in all competitions in each of her first two campaigns with Paris.

• The Canadian international came on as a substitute in both of the friendlies against Mexico last month, scoring in a 2-1 defeat on 27 November.

Sakina Karchaoui
• The 25-year-old scored her first European goal on Matchday 4.

• The defender has supplied two assists in the group stage; no Paris player has more.

• Karchaoui signed for Paris in July this year, joining from Lyon – with whom she won the 2019/20 UEFA Women's Champions League in her solitary campaign – after eight years in the first team at Montpellier, where she came through the ranks.

• Part of the France side that reached the 2017 UEFA Women's EURO quarter-finals and made one appearance as they reached the last eight of the FIFA Women's World Cup two years later.

Marie-Antoinette Katoto
• The 23-year-old has scored three goals across the last two matchdays, making it 12 in her last 13 European appearances.

• Katoto has scored 17 UEFA Women's Champions League career goals – all in her last 19 appearances.

• The Paris youth product, who joined the Les Rouge-et-Bleu at the age of 12, topped the Division 1 Féminine scoring charts in both 2018/19 and 2019/20, but her tally of 21 strikes last season was one short of Bordeaux's Khadija Shaw.

• Started both of France's recent FIFA Women's World Cup qualifiers, scoring in the 6-0 victory against Kazakhstan on 26 November.

Key stats

• Kharkiv have lost two of their eight European matches this season (W5 D1).

• The Ukrainian club did not score in either of their first two home Group B matches.

• Paris are the only team still to concede a goal in the group stage.

• The French team won each of their first two Grup B away games 2-0.

• Paris have won seven of their last eight away UEFA Women's Champions League matches, excluding last season's 3-0 forfeit defeat at Sparta Praha.