It was bound to happen. Kylian Mbappé spoke, and once again, French soccer rushed to dissect every single one of his words. This time, the crime is almost unforgivable: the France captain dared to consider himself the best player in the world last season. “There was no one better than me last season,” he said as the Ballon d’Or approaches. A sentence that, in a world where soccer players are constantly told to believe in themselves, suddenly seems to have become too arrogant.
Yet where is the actual problem?
Mbappé is not asking journalists to give him the Ballon d’Or. He is not asking fans to consider his opinion a universal truth. He is not denying the existence of his competitors. He is simply giving his own opinion about his own season. And perhaps more importantly, he is finally publicly embracing what we have known since the beginning of his career: Kylian Mbappé plays to be the best.
Does a player no longer have the right to believe in himself?
There is a strange contradiction surrounding Kylian Mbappé.
Since his teenage years, he has been criticized for having excessive ambition. But that ambition is also precisely what helped build the player he has become. At Monaco, PSG, with the French national team and now at Real Madrid, Mbappé has never hidden his desire to win, score goals, break records and establish himself at the top.
And now that he says he believes he was the best, we want to criticize him for… being consistent with who he has always been.
He would almost have to adopt the opposite attitude. Explain that maybe he is not good enough. Apologize for scoring goals. Remind everyone that other players are fantastic and that he certainly should not think he is better than them. In modern soccer, humility has become a media obligation. A player can think he is the best, but he absolutely has to avoid saying it.
Why?
The problem obviously isn’t that Mbappé thinks he is the best. The problem, for some people, seems to be that he refuses to pretend he thinks otherwise.
We can debate his résumé. We can believe Ousmane Dembélé, Lamine Yamal or others deserve the Ballon d’Or more. We can believe that team trophies should carry significant weight in the judgment. We can even believe that Mbappé did not have the best season of his career. All of that belongs to the soccer debate.
But his personal opinion does not have to be put to a referendum.
When a striker says he believes he was the best, he is not stating a scientific fact. He is asserting an ambition. And that ambition is part of who he is.
Mbappé did not become Mbappé because he’s doubting himself
There is also something deeply logical about this statement when you know his story.
Mbappé has long explained that he grew up with the idea that he was “the chosen one.” That label was placed on him at a very young age, sometimes by the media, sometimes by the public, sometimes by the people around him. He grew up under the constant expectation that he would become the successor to the greatest players.
So why should he now be criticized for internalizing that expectation?
You cannot ask a player to spend fifteen years with the goal of reaching the very top and then criticize him for saying he believes he has reached it.
Soccer loves champions when they are dominant on the field, but becomes much more uncomfortable when they are just as assertive in their communication.
Cristiano Ronaldo turned it into a philosophy. Zlatan Ibrahimović turned it into a character. Michael Jordan certainly did not build himself through constant self-doubt. Even the greatest competitors in sports history developed that inner conviction that they were capable of being better than everyone else.
And no one asked them to apologize for having that mentality.
Mbappé, meanwhile, seems condemned to a permanent trial whenever he steps outside the expected framework.
When he talks about soccer, we analyze his ego. When he talks about politics, we analyze his legitimacy. When he talks about his career, we analyze his ambition. When he talks about his performances, we analyze his arrogance.
At some point, perhaps the problem is no longer what Mbappé says.
It is the way we listen to him. It is perfectly possible to disagree with Kylian Mbappé without turning his opinion into a matter of national importance.
That is, after all, probably the essence of sports debate.
Mbappé believes he was the best player of last season? Fine. Dembélé can believe he was better. Yamal can consider himself and Mbappé the two best players in the world. Journalists can defend a fourth opinion. Fans can have a fifth.
That is precisely what soccer is.
The Ballon d’Or will be there to settle the different perceptions of the season. The votes will determine which player convinced the greatest number of voters. But the award obviously does not prevent everyone else from believing they should have won it.
And that is the whole difference between expressing an opinion and imposing a truth.
Mbappé is not saying, “You are wrong to think otherwise.” He is essentially saying, “I believe I was the best.”
Why should that sentence be considered shocking?
Because it comes from Mbappé?
That is probably where the real paradox lies. The Frenchman is often criticized for being too visible in the media, too confident, too aware of his status. But when a player of his caliber agrees to speak openly about his ambitions, he is simply producing what professional sports have always produced: narrative, rivalry and confrontation.
And soccer needs that.
It needs players who want to be the best. It needs players who believe they can surpass their competitors. It needs personalities capable of saying “I,” not just players trained to answer “we.”
Mbappé does not need to be defended every time. He certainly does not need every one of his statements to be turned into an absolute truth. But he deserves at least the same thing we grant any great champion: the right to believe in his own greatness.
It is possible to find Mbappé arrogant. It is possible to prefer Dembélé. It is possible to vote for Yamal. It is possible to believe that a player absolutely has to win trophies to be considered the best.
But it is also possible to look Mbappé straight in the eye and answer: “You think you’re the best? Fine. Prove it.”
And that is probably the only response that truly deserves to be given.
Because deep down, the strangest thing would not be for Kylian Mbappé to think he is the best player in the world.
The strangest thing would be for a player who has spent his entire career trying to become the best to suddenly pretend he does not believe it.