France’s Mbappe proving he’s best player in World
It’s Kylian Mbappe’s World Cup until proven otherwise, and there was no evidence to the contrary on Sunday.
It is the last World Cup for Messi and Ronaldo, but it just might be that the torch passed to the French sensation four years ago, when he led Les Bleus to the title. Now, he is merely carrying it. Mbappe was magic in France’s 3-1 Round of 16 win over Poland, scoring two brilliant goals in what turned into a routine victory.
“It’s the competition of my dreams,” Mbappe said in French, per L’Equipe, following the match, his first time speaking to reporters since the World Cup began. “I built my season on this competi- tion. … But we are still far from the objective that we have set ourselves, that I have set myself, which is to win.”
France will play England, a 3-0 winner over Senegal on Sunday, in a quarterfinal Saturday.
Though Olivier Giroud opened the scoring near the first half’s end, it was Mbappe who sealed it in the 74th minute. On a counterattacking move, the ball came to Mbappe on the left side of the box. So calm and composed that he essentially walked up to it amid open play, Mbappe smashed it to the near side, doubling the lead.
Later, in the 91st minute, Mbappe got it in the same area. This time, he bent it to the far side, as if to show off.
Poland’s Robert Lewandowski converted a penalty on the game’s last kick as consolation. Giroud’s goal helped him overtake Thierry Henry to be France’s all-time leading scorer, but it is Mbappe with five goals in the tournament to lead the running for the golden boot, who will be the object of conversation.
“It’s incredible, it’s true, the goals he scores,” French midfielder Adrien Rabiot said, per L’Equipe. “The positions, the angles he manages to find. It’s great. It’s what we expect of him.”
Mbappe is picking up right where he left off in Russia four years ago, when he became the youngest French player to score at a World Cup and the second teenager ever to score in a World Cup final — the first being Pele. This time around, he is all of 23, and holds a claim as the best player in the world. That he is the best on an international stage — where Messi has historically disappointed and Ronaldo is currently diminished from his European title-winning peak — seems almost beyond doubt. As the World Cup was once Pele’s stage, it is now Mbappe’s, and he owned it on Sunday.
“To be honest, no,” Mbappe said, asked whether he thought about the Ballon d’Or, given to the best player in the world each year. “The only goal is to win the World Cup. It’s my dream, it’s the only dream, that’s why I came here.”
France spent the 90 minutes of this game in control, rarely looking threatened by a Polish squad that spent too much of the tournament looking in vain for a way to attack. Poland had its moments in the first half, including a thrice-thwarted effort inside the France penalty area, but Les Bleus look very much on their way to another run. If it does repeat, France would be the first country to win the World Cup twice in a row since Brazil in 1958 and 1962.
Certainly, it is safe to say they have the tournament’s best player.