There is something old-fashioned about a player defined by the World Cup. Kylian Mbappe can seem a face of sleek modernity, but perhaps he is a throwback footballer. The World Cup is his stage; perhaps no footballer for decades can say that to the same extent.
As Mbappe claimed France’s goalscoring record, and advanced past Pele and Just Fontaine’s totals in World Cups to draw level with Gerd Muller, Didier Deschamps talked of the global audience. Mbappe, he said, did not want to pass Olivier Giroud’s tally for Les Bleus in a friendly. He did it instead against Senegal in the World Cup, in the world’s most famous city. He can prosper when the eyes of the footballing planet are on one match, and one alone. And, in an ever more crowded fixture list, that is rarely the case. Mbappe started this tournament with a very different double of high class. “In this match with a global audience, he has a real aura,” noted Deschamps.
His aura, unlike his peers’, comes from such days. Some of the legends of earlier generations were defined more by World Cups. Santos and Napoli fans may disagree but Pele and Diego Maradona were. Paolo Rossi, Mario Kempes and Fontaine too. For audiences outside South America, Garrincha and Jairzinho were always going to be. For those outside England, Bobby Moore and Geoff Hurst are.
Then there is Mbappe; perhaps headed for a third World Cup final in a competition that is the ultimate, but not the constant in the conversation. For much of the time, it can seem the power dynamic between club and country has shifted decisively away from the international game. The Champions League has felt dominant in the age of Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo. The Ballons d’Or don’t always tend to be won by World Cup winners: Messi did in 2023, for the 2022 tournament, but before him Fabio Cannavaro had been the last to do that particular double.
Now two Frenchmen have won the Ballon d’Or in the last four years; Benzema and Dembele. Their primary achievements do not lie in international football. Meanwhile, Mbappe has been on the podium as often as Jorginho and in the same spot: third.
Which illustrates the way he can appear a man out of time. Despite the 373 goals he has scored for Monaco, Paris Saint-Germain and Real Madrid, his case for greatness stems more from his return for country than club. And not merely because Giroud – as well as Michel Platini, Zinedine Zidane and Thierry Henry – has been left for dust as he sped past them.
At club level, though, he has been in the wrong place at the wrong time. Real Madrid won three Champions Leagues when he was at Paris Saint-Germain. PSG have won two since he joined Real. There is a tactical argument that sides with players where everyone presses are likelier to conquer Europe. Of late, teams without a genuine centre-forward have done so. Real had Jude Bellingham as something approximating to a false nine in 2024, PSG used Ousmane Dembele as a deep-lying striker in 2025 and 2026.
Deschamps referenced the impression Mbappe does too little off the ball. “People will still criticise him,” he said. “On one action he really is able to tip the scales and bring his team to victory. People say he doesn’t defend enough – well, he isn’t here to defend.”
And maybe international football, less reliant on systems and more liable to be determined by individuals, suits Mbappe better. He can play in fits and spurts. “If he wants to miss the first half again and score the two goals again in the second half of another match that is good for me,” said Deschamps.
Indeed, arguably Mbappe has been mediocre in the first half of his last two World Cup games and yet ended them with a combined five goals. They are separated by almost four years: in 2022, he joined Hurst in the select band of those who have scored a World Cup final hat-trick.
After the treble in the 2022 final, the brace in France’s 2026 opener. It is an extraordinary impact and quite a few of his Muller-equalling 14 have been spectacular. There was the devastating pace to score against Argentina in 2018, the 25-yard shot against Croatia in the Moscow final, a whipped shot into the top corner against Poland four years ago, a volley against Argentina for his second in Lusail, the arrowed finish and 30-yard thunderbolt against Senegal.
The remarkable fact is not that he has got 58 goals for France. It is that nearly a quarter have come in World Cups and that, with 48-team tournaments presumably here to stay and him young enough to play in two more, he could retire as the greatest goalscorer ever in the global gatherings. Whether or not he is ever a Champions League winner, he may be Monsieur World Cup.
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