Kylian Mbappe is fully expected to join Real Madrid this summer. Stop if you have read that sentence before. It’s been uttered in the 2021 and 2022 summer transfer windows, with the end result, in both cases, being Mbappe staying and getting eliminated from the Champions League in quick fashion.
So it’s remarkable to kick around the possibility of PSG finally winning the Champions League for the first time, and doing it, out of all the years of Qatar investment, in Mbappe’s final season.
Kylian Mbappe chose money over Real Madrid
After Mbappe sulked to the stands when Luis Enrique benched him prematurely in yet another important Ligue 1 match, the French superstar’s fate seemed to be sealed. All the public comments, letters, and rumors fan the flames, but maybe the most telling sign is how little resistance PSG themselves have put up this time around when it comes to trying to keep Mbappe or quell rumors of his departure.
Many Real Madrid fans have harbored ill will towards Mbappe ever since he backed out of a reported handshake agreement with Florentino Perez in January 2022 to join Real Madrid that June.
Mbappe decided to take an unprecedented contract from PSG in order to stay at the last minute, perhaps influenced by other actors around him – and even politically.
His contract with PSG in 2022 included 235 million dollars over three years with 65 million dollars in bonuses. It was the richest contract ever handed to a footballer, made all the more richer by the fact that PSG gave him some say in transfer decisions and hired executive extraordinaire Luis Campos to help run the ship.
At the time, many thought Mbappe was delusional for choosing money and power to stay at PSG and be irrelevant for two more seasons instead of chasing Champions League and Ballon d’Or glory with Real Madrid. At least, that’s the refrain Madridistas sang.
Kylian Mbappe is finally stepping up as a leader for PSG
Instead, maybe Mbappe made the right decision. Real Madrid didn’t win the Champions League or even LaLiga in 2022/23. And right now, they are not the favorites to reach the semifinals against Manchester City, as they drew 3-3 at the Santiago Bernabeu.
Meanwhile, PSG are headed to the semifinals for the first time since the 2019/20 season, when they were better finishing from Mbappe and Neymar away from dethroning eventual treble winners Bayern Munich in the final.
PSG secured their spot thanks to Mbappe, who was heroic in the second leg at the Spotify Camp Nou, scoring in the 89th minute to secure a brace and a 4-1 victory for the Parisians to ensure a 6-4 triumph on aggregate.
For the first time, PSG showed guts in the Champions League. Instead of collapsing to a Remontada, which they did in the past to both Barcelona and Real Madrid, the Ligue 1 champions mounted a comeback of their own.
Kylian Mbappe has the Real Madrid DNA
All of that was behind the star power of Kylian Mbappe, who answered so many critics with his performance. Mbappe shined on the brightest stage and elevated his team, doing so after facing heavy criticism for an invisible first leg performance in front of his own fans.
With criticisms that his head was in the clouds and already at Real Madrid, Mbappe delivered a Madridista-esque Champions League knockout performance to help deliver the goods for a PSG side in desperate need of that kind of UCL statement win.
The timing of the performance is quite fitting for a move to the Bernabeu. Real Madrid superstars need to have that clutch gene in their “DNA”, and while Mbappe has shown up big in World Cup Finals, he wasn’t essential to France’s victory in 2018 and ultimately fell short to Lionel Messi and Argentina in the last Final. And there is that gaping penalty miss in the Euro knockouts vs. Yann Sommer and Switzerland.
Kylian Mbappe is ‘The Guy’ for PSG without Lionel Messi and Neymar
Amidst criticism and speculation, Mbappe rose above it all to help PSG take care of business against an elite European team that will one day be the Frenchman’s chief rival at Real Madrid, FC Barcelona.
Mbappe got his money, took his lumps, and is now pushing his childhood club to the Champions League semifinals without Neymar, Messi, or anyone else who can claim to be anywhere near him. He is THE guy in Paris and the clear superstar leading the team to glory.
That’s the last thing Mbappe needed to feel his career in Paris is complete and take that next step to being THE guy on a team full of players who qualify as THE guy, namely Vinicius Jr. and new addition Jude Bellingham. As much as Real Madrid fans may hate to admit it, hindsight as shown that, in his own way, Mbappe is coming to the Bernabeu at the exact right time.
