Last Thursday, coach Didier Deschamps revealed his list for the next gathering of the French team and decided to do without Kylian Mbappé, captain of the Blues, for the two upcoming Nations League matches, against Israel, on Thursday in Budapest, then in Belgium, the following Monday, in Brussels. “I spoke with Kylian obviously (…) He has a match on Saturday, in 48 hours. There are questions. He has a problem that is not serious, but requires treatment to recover properly. I’m not here to take risks.”explained the coach at a press conference, to preserve his player.
However, Kylian Mbappé started well in the match against Villarreal on Saturday evening (2-0). And if Didier Deschamps did not want to take any risks, Carlo Ancelotti decided to line him up for 70 minutes, before he gave way to Rodrygo for the remainder of the match. An MRI carried out on Friday morning confirmed that Mbappé was fit to play and Real Madrid wanted to do their best to preserve their striker for the international break, as they have already been able to do with Eduardo Camavinga or Ferland Mendy.
Kylian Mbappé missed everything
Except that the level of Kylian Mbappé (25 years old) was worrying. Already appearing delicate when he entered Lille in the Champions League, the ex-Parisian completely missed his match, but appeared on his feet from the first minutes. Apart from two blocked strikes and an off-target volley, the French international completely missed his match, particularly in the second half, where he disappeared from the radar with a total of 2 successful dribbles out of 7, 10 lost balls and therefore no shots frame.
The Spanish press, which mainly commented on Dani Carvajal’s serious injury after the match, focused on Kylian Mbappé’s statistics, but above all insisted on the fact that Vinicius Jr was really the star of the team merengue at the start of the season, as evidenced by his magnificent goal just after the Frenchman’s exit. A performance and management which greatly questioned Madrid followers because of his supposed injury, but also because Kylian Mbappé still does not convince after 13 matches played under his new colors.
