There are worse things in life and in football than to be subjected to playing alongside Lionel Messi and Neymar.
Don’t tell that to Kylian Mbappe.
Five months ago the French striker shocked the football world and re-signed with Paris St-Germain on a three-year deal instead of becoming the latest in a long line of Galacticos at Real Madrid.
“I have chosen to extend my contract at Paris Saint-Germain, and I am very happy. I am convinced that here I can continue to grow within a club that gives itself all the means to perform at the highest level,” he said at the time.
On the evening he became the Parisian club’s all-time top scorer in Europe’s premiere competition, a penalty against Benfica enough to leapfrog Edinson Cavani, reports broke that the young talisman was unhappy with his situation, expressing his desire to depart and his regret in staying at the club that has delivered him untold amounts of success.
Betrayal was the word used by Mbappe’s camp as the primary motivator behind his departure desire. Betrayed by the fact that conditions set out, which included how the club would play: in a modern pressing style, how they would capitalise on their location: by not wasting the talent factory of Paris and its surrounds, and who they would sign: young French talent.
Such a circus led to much conjecture that Mbappe, not Luis Campos, was PSG’s sporting director. Thankfully for the club, that is not the case. Had it been, Neymar – who has 10 per cent of his Ligue 1 goals and 15 per cent of his Ligue 1 assists this season – would have been shunned out the door as part of the striker’s belief that the side is only big enough for two superstars – himself and Lionel Messi.
Happier times (Photo by Jose Breton/Pics Action/NurPhoto via Getty Images)
Additionally, Mbappe is discontent with his position. Not within the club, but on the field. Reportedly his preference is to play alongside Messi and a traditional No.9 cut from a similar mould to national teammates Karim Benzema and Olivier Giroud, rather than in the current PSG attacking configuration.
Demands of the ego are not unusual or uncharacteristic for a boy who has had the world at his feet since he tore through French and European football with AS Monaco six years ago, yet it is blinding him to a condition that all stars learn at least once in their career.
The art of self-sacrifice.
Thierry Henry summarised it best on CBS Sports: “If the coach asks you, you do it!”
France’s all-time top-scorer then posed whether it is “the true essence of a great player to be able to accommodate to what the boss wants and to make others shine”.
“No one likes to be exposed to what you’re not good at,” Henry added.
Arsenal’s greatest-ever player drew comparisons to his own tenure under Pep Guardiola at FC Barcelona. Arguably the Premier League’s greatest-ever striker joined one of football’s greatest-ever sides and was immediately forced into unfamiliar territory.
His new role was to be the left-winger in a front three where he needed to be disciplined, hold his width, particularly before while the ball was being brought out from the back, before he was then allowed to explode alongside Mbappe’s current teammate, Lionel Messi, and Samuel Eto’o. Together they were key components of Barcelona’s historic 2009 sextuple-winning season.
In fact, at some point throughout their career, Barcelona’s attacking configuration for that 2009 campaign all had to sacrifice themselves and exit their comfort zone for the good of the team. Messi moved off the wing and into a false-9 role, a move that in theory limited the space afforded to him and exposed him to a plethora of opposition defenders, most of who aimed to stop him by any means necessary.
Samuel Eto’o, one of the game’s finest-ever strikers, shifted wide to accommodate Messi’s false-9 endeavour. That’s not the only sacrifice of his career.
Moving to Inter Milan in 2010 and linking up with Jose Mourinho saw the Cameroonian, much like Henry, move from his traditional role of centre-forward out to the left, this time in Mourinho’s preferred 4-2-3-1 system.
Like Guardiola’s shift of Henry, and Messi, Eto’o’s compromise worked. Inter won a historic treble. The Cameroonian was key to that success and will be remembered fondly on the blue half of Milan for a millennium.
That 2009 frontline epitomised another comment Henry made on the coverage.
“There is something that’s bigger than everyone else. It’s the club.”
Great players, they play, no matter where they are asked to appear. They sacrifice themselves, make themselves vulnerable, expose their deficiencies, all for the good of the collective. Countless juggernauts of the sport exemplify this spirit.
(Photo by Jean Catuffe/Getty Images)
Football is, after all, a team sport. Individuals may win matches but teams and systems win it all. PSG are primely positioned on the European front to claim the elusive Champions League two years on from heartbreak against Bayern Munich.
Delivering European glory to the foot of the Eiffel Tower would solidify his presence as a club great and dispel any misgivings held against him. That looks unlikely now.
That momentum is surely ruined. The man PSG have wagered their future on is concrete in his decision. He wants to leave in January, potentially having hoisted his second World Cup for France alongside Benzema and Giroud.
Yet, where can this star boy go? Any club in the world would yearn for his signature. He improves every side he enters.
Very few, however, can afford him. Real Madrid have been reported in L’Equipe as being pessimistic in their chances of signing him in the winter window, his salary noted as a potential roadblock, plus the fact he severely burnt his bridges in the Spanish capital during the summer.
But if it is not Madrid, then where is it? He surely cannot stay put now. He has gotten everyone, from senior management, to playing staff, right through to the fans offside. There are reports he has frayed relationships with Achraf Hakimi, Hugo Ekitike, Nordi Mukiele, Presnel Kimpembe, and Christophe Galtier.
Moving forward, how can any club trust Mbappe, their multi-million-dollar superstar, to perform and not kick up a fuss at any sign of ‘betrayal’? No coach or player wants to walk around eggshells near anyone, let alone their talisman. I wonder how many clubs have become alienated by his clearly poor attitude.
A lot remains rumoured, up in the air, about the Mbappe predicament. What is apparent is that learning self-sacrifice would benefit the Frenchman’s career greatly.
Maybe Thierry could throw an arm around him and show him the way?
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