Kylian Mbappé

Biography of Kylian Mbappé

Kylian Sanmi Mbappé Lottin, known in the world of soccer as Kylian Mbappé or just Mbappé, is a French soccer player of Cameroonian and Algerian descent who plays as a striker; He is also recognized as one of the promising forwards in world soccer. He was born on December 20, 1998 in Paris, France and is the son of Wilfried Mbappé and Fayza Mbappé. From a very young age he showed an interest in soccer and stood out for his dribbling, speed, control and ball power; In addition, he highlighted that his favorite players have been Zinedine Zidane and Cristiano Ronaldo.

Club career

He made his professional debut with France’s Monaco on December 2, 2015, in his team’s draw against SM Caen in Ligue 1; he came on as a substitute for Fábio Coentrão in the 88th minute, becoming the youngest senior debutant for Monaco at the age of 16 years and 347 days, breaking Thierry Henry’s record.

On February 20, 2016, Kylian Mbappé scored his first goal as a professional in his team’s 3-1 victory over Troyes; in this way, he became the youngest player to score a goal for Monaco at the age of 17 years and 62 days. On March 6 of that same year, the player signed his first professional contract, which was registered for 3 years.

Kylian Mbappé scored his first hat-trick on December 14, 2016, when Monaco defeated Stade Rennais F.C. 7-0 in the round of 16 of the league cup.

On February 11, 2017, Mbappé scored his first hat-trick in Ligue 1, after Monaco’s 5-0 victory over FC Metz. On February 21 of that same year, he scored the second goal for Monaco in the first leg of the UEFA Champions League round of 16 against Manchester City, where Monaco was defeated 5-3. On March 5, he scored two goals in Monaco’s 4-0 victory over FC Nantes, becoming the youngest player in the last 30 years to reach that figure in Ligue 1.

In the return leg of the UEFA Champions League round of 16 against Manchester City, he contributed with a goal in Monaco’s 3-1 victory (global 6-6) and advanced to the quarterfinals. On April 12, 2017, he scored 2 goals in Monaco’s 2-3 victory in the first leg of the Champions League quarterfinals against Borussia Dortmund. His team managed to reach the UEFA Champions League semifinals, where it was eliminated by Juventus of Italy.

At the end of the 2016-2017 season, Mbappé became Ligue 1 champion with his team Monaco. In addition, he managed to score 26 goals in all the competitions played that season.

Consolidation with PSG

Premio al mejor jugador joven y mejor jugador del Mundial 2018| Crédito: Эдгар Брещанов, CC BY-SA 3.0 GFDL, via Wikimedia Commons

Kylian Mbappé’s excellent performance made the best clubs in Europe interested in him. On August 31, 2017, Mbappé’s loan to Paris Saint-Germain was made official, with a mandatory purchase option of 180 million euros at the end of the 2017-2018 season.

He made his debut with PSG on September 8, 2017 in his team’s 5-1 victory over FC Metz; In addition, he managed to score his first goal with his new club in that game.

On October 23, 2017, Kylian Mbappé was awarded the Golden Boy award given by the Italian sports newspaper Tuttosport to the best player under 21 of the year. On October 7, 2018, he scored four goals for the first time in his career in the 5-0 victory over Olympique Lyon. At the beginning of the new year, he reached 20 goals in the season by scoring a hat-trick against En Avant de Guingam. On February 12, 2019, he scored in the 0-2 victory against Manchester United at Old Trafford. As a candidate for the Golden Boot of that season, a hat-trick allowed him to reach 30 goals in Ligue 1 on April 21, against Monaco. He was the second person to achieve this feat after Jean-Pierre Papin in 1990.

Mbappé was the main reference of the club in what was one of the best times of his career (2018-19). The next season, the sport, like other areas of daily life, was affected by the outbreak of type 2 coronavirus, which became a pandemic in March 2020. The outbreak forced the UEFA, FFF, and LFP to cancel competitions, and competitions were not resumed until months later after a decrease in deaths due to population confinement.

For the 2020-21 season, after returning to the field, the team lost Ligue 1 to Lille Olympique Sporting Club, despite Mbappé being the top scorer in the tournament (with 27 goals). Then, PSG had a magnificent tournament, and after qualifying as first in their group, they faced Fútbol Club Barcelona in the round of 16. In the first leg, Mbappé scored a hat-trick that received praise and accolades in the international press. Finally, a 1-1 draw in the second leg secured PSG’s qualification.

In the quarterfinals, they faced Bayern Munich, and Mbappé was decisive again with two goals in Germany. Mbappé contributed to the team’s qualification for the semifinals; he also became the standout player of the tournament after scoring five goals away from home (against Barca and then against Bayern). In the final, Chelsea won the title.

One of Mbappé’s dreams is undoubtedly to achieve glory at the club level, win the UEFA Champions League and the Club World Cup, the top competitions at that level. The year 2022 seemed to be the right time to achieve these goals, since PSG had a team full of stars such as Sergio Ramos, Lionel Messi

, and Neymar.

After comfortably advancing in the Champions League group stage, he had to face a huge challenge, facing the all-time winner of this competition, Real Madrid C.F. It was a series full of emotions, as in the first leg Mbappé was able to show his quality, advancing PSG in the series. However, the second leg had special ingredients: a full and expectant Santiago Bernabéu Stadium looking to see what they thought would be their new signing: Mabappé. Kylian was up to the task, advancing PSG 0-2 and almost sentencing the key. Popular culture says ’90 minutes at the Bernabéu are very long’, and Mbappé firsthand experienced one of the magical nights at the Bernabéu; with Karim Benzema as the main star, who in just 17 minutes scored an anthology hat-trick that eliminated PSG and with it Mbappé’s aspirations to be consecrated at the club level.

Current

Currently, Mbappé’s stay at PSG was in doubt after the signing of Messi, as he wanted to lead a football project and the arrival of Messi could mean being in the shadow of the Argentine star. In addition, the famous elimination suffered at the Santiago Bernabéu left in the air the idea that Kylian might have opted for Real Madrid, a team he had been in talks with throughout 2022. However, after reaching a verbal agreement with Florentino Pérez, his plans took an unexpected turn and he decided to renew with PSG in mid-May 2022. This renewal, which will extend until 2025, was influenced by the intervention of the high French and Qatari political circles and sparked a great controversy on a global level, especially in the Spanish press.

Florentino Pérez: “This is not my Mbappé.”

National team career

Kylian Mbappé began his journey with the French national team in the under-17 and under-19 categories. He made his debut on September 10, 2014 in the under-17 category, when the French national team defeated Ukraine 1-0.

After his debut with Monaco, he began to be called up to the under-19 national team of his country. He made his official competition debut on March 24, 2016, where he started and his national team won 1-0 against Montenegro. On March 26, he scored his first goal for France, in the 4-0 victory of his national team over Denmark. France qualified for the final phase of the UEFA European Under-19 Championship 2016 with a perfect score; In addition, Kylian Mbappé managed to win that competition with his national team, after defeating Italy 4-0 in the final.

On March 16, 2017, he was called up for the first time to the senior national team, to play the matches corresponding to the European eliminator for the 2018 World Cup in Russia. On March 25 of that same year, he made his debut with the senior national team, where the French national team won 3-0 against Luxembourg. On August 31, Mbappé managed to score his first goal with the senior national team, in the 4-0 victory of France against the Netherlands.

On October 10, 2017, Mbappé was part of the roster that qualified the French national team for the 2018 World Cup in Russia. In that World Cup, the French national team would be crowned champion for the second time in its history. Mbappé was one of the team’s stars, contributing four goals: one against Peru, two against the Argentine national team and the final goal against Croatia. For his merits, he was awarded the award for Best Player of the tournament.

En 2021, Mbappé participated in the Euro 2020 and became the champion of the UEFA Nations League, scoring one goal and assisting in the 2-1 victory against Spain.

For the year 2022, he arrived consolidated as a world star at the World Cup in Qatar. Unlike the World Cup in Russia, the expectations for the French National Team and for Mbappé in particular were quite high; after the injury of the season’s Ballon d’Or, Karim Benzema, the leadership of the team rested undoubtedly on Kylian’s shoulders. For the process of the initial phase and the first elimination rounds, he counted on the brilliance of the roster, especially that of Antoine Griezmann. The performance of the French National Team was up to expectations, qualifying for the final of the tournament in which they will seek the third World Cup for France on December 18; Mbappé in particular will seek his second consecutive World Cup title.