After Paris Saint-Germain clinched a second successive Ligue 1 title on Wednesday, AFP Sports traces five key moments that helped the French capital club retain their crown:

- After a sluggish start to the season, PSG's new coach Laurent Blanc quickly ditched the 4-4-2 formation favoured by his predecessor Carlo Ancelotti and switched to a 4-3-3. A 2-0 win at Bordeaux at the start of September was when the new system clicked and was when it became clear that Blanc had found the way to get the best out of his midfield. Thiago Motta controlled the game, Blaise Matuidi scored one goal and Marco Verratti made another. Zlatan Ibrahimovic later raved about the performance, comparing it to that produced in the 1-1 draw away to Barcelona in last season's Champions League quarter-finals. PSG were now properly up and running under Blanc, the former Bordeaux coach.

- PSG looked set to suffer their first defeat of the season when they had Thiago Motta sent off and then went 1-0 down in the first half away to bitter rivals Marseille at the start of October. However, the 10 men showed superb character to equalise before the break through Maxwell, and Zlatan Ibrahimovic then scored to seal a 2-1 victory midway through the second period. A week later, they went top of the table for the first time and they were never to relinquish that position.

- As impressive as Paris were, they were helped by the lack of a genuine challenger. Following their huge spending spree last summer, Monaco were the best-placed to put up a fight, but a 2-1 home loss to Valenciennes in their last outing before Christmas confirmed that Claudio Ranieri's side were not quite championship-winning material. Had they won, they would have gone into the winter break level on points with PSG. Instead they ended 2013 three points adrift and that gap continued to grow in the second half of the season.

- Never was PSG's superiority over the rest of French football more evident than in the 5-0 home win against Nantes in January. That night, Zlatan Ibrahimovic scored twice as Blanc's men destroyed once-proud Nantes, champions eight times themselves. PSG toyed with their opponents, completing a record 863 passes, on their way to equalling their biggest winning margin of the season.

- A 3-0 home win against Reims in April secured a club record eighth consecutive Ligue 1 win and left them on the brink of the title. The blow of their Champions League elimination at the hands of Chelsea a few days later slowed their domestic charge, but their relentless run into the spring gave them sufficient margin with which to play.