Kylian Mbappe | PSG

Players with this kind of pace combined with intelligence don't come along often. They present a unique problem, which is further amplified in an era of high lines and pressing - you simply cannot get into any kind of foot race with him as a defender. To do so (assuming equivalent pace in the first place) you'd have to be fully turned towards your own goal and not on the half-turn as normal because you'll never make up those initial steps from there.

Theoretically, you've got to sit deep, negate his pace and concede space between the lines, or ball up. You would think that'd be a playground for Neymar and other creative types in their team. We'd be stupid to go out there for the second leg adopting any kind of plan that repeats on our attempt in this leg to try match Bailly off with him because he stripped him easily, and one more goal for them and we're done.

Outside of our remaining encounter, I do hope that pace of his isn't taken from him via injury; would love to see the organic conclusion of his peak ability. He's still overrated to date, but the scope and potential he has are enormous.
 
He's so fecking good. What a talent.

Can see him winning them the CL in the next couple of years and winning a couple of Balon D'or's in the post Messi/Ronaldo era.
 
What is with all these comments bigging up Mbappe? Were we watching the same game? He didn't do anything of note outside of the goal. Sure it was a great move and finish but the comments are over the top ffs. Verratti and Di Maria were much better than him.
 
VorZakone said:
I don't recall him missing 2 sitters?
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I assume that people are talking about the chip shot and the offside. In my opinion neither were sitters but I tend to see a lot less sitters than others seem to.
 
Trizy said:
What is with all these comments bigging up Mbappe? Were we watching the same game? He didn't do anything of note outside of the goal. Sure it was a great move and finish but the comments are over the top ffs. Verratti and Di Maria were much better than him.
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That's because we fouled him every time he got turned and running. Let's be honest our defence were shitting themselves with the presence of his pace being there.

The 1 clear chance he got he scored. The other DDG made a good save, but IMO his first touch was a bit heavy which tightened the angle. For his age he's absolutely class IMO.
 
Adam-Utd said:
That's because we fouled him every time he got turned and running. Let's be honest our defence were shitting themselves with the presence of his pace being there.

The 1 clear chance he got he scored. The other DDG made a good save, but IMO his first touch was a bit heavy which tightened the angle. For his age he's absolutely class IMO.
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Of course he's class for his age and we all know his massive potential but he wasn't anywhere near as good in last nights game to warrant half the comments drooling over him.
 
Trizy said:
Of course he's class for his age and we all know his massive potential but he wasn't anywhere near as good in last nights game to warrant half the comments drooling over him.
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Sometimes you can be good by just offering a threat. He allowed his team to dominate possession by always being a threat over the top. We could never push up because of his threat.
 
JPRouve said:
Today Neymar is a far better player, particularly since he loves playing with Mbappé.
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Aye but if we're talking about them in their early stages/breakthrough seasons then the comparison is a bit more exciting. Neymar is the established player at this point, while Mbappe still has plenty of potential to fulfill.
 
Adam-Utd said:
Sometimes you can be good by just offering a threat. He allowed his team to dominate possession by always being a threat over the top. We could never push up because of his threat.
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You could apply the same logic to every team doubling up on Martial terrified of him. It's just PSG as a team are good enough to capitalize against 1 less defender across the pitch.
 
I thought PSG was crazy paying that much money for him, but now its clear that by outbidding Real Madrid they got themselves the heir to Messi/Ronaldo. A great player.
 
I didn't think he was that good yesterday. His speed is unreal though.
 
Stupidly fast, to the point its practically cheating. It doesn't even look like his legs are moving that quick, he just takes gigantic leaps and bounces off the turf. Amazing to watch, when he's not playing us...
 
he is the best young talent around though rashford and martial are still very very good, he is like a messi but the others are like still really good in their own right!
 
Was saying to a mate yesterday, how much fun it would be to watch him if he was causing a different team the amount of problems he was causing us.

His game intelligence impressed me more than anything else yesterday though, just knowing when to put his foot on the ball and slow the game down and when to keep it moving and speed the game up. It's something that is hard to teach and he's got it already.
 
Did feck all for most of the game, but a goal seems to sway peoples minds. Yes, as a striker, he's ultimately going to be judged on goals, but his general wasnt good yesterday.
 
Walters_19_MuFc said:
Did feck all for most of the game, but a goal seems to sway peoples minds. Yes, as a striker, he's ultimately going to be judged on goals, but his general wasnt good yesterday.
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That's because you're not taking into account the difficulty of yesterday's job. Mbappe would have seen a lot more of the ball and created far more danger had Cavani been healthy and he could have occupied one of the wings and start coming centrally and play off Cavani with Di Maria in support. He had to be shifted up front where he would most likely (and did) touch the ball far less than he normally does, with the whole defense focused on him, and he still managed to slip by and score one. That's extraordinarily difficult when the whole team is focused on you and you're playing a role where as soon as you touch the ball, you have 2-3 players on you. It's silly to complain he did 'feck all' when his role was never going to allow him to do what he usually does.
 
Trizy said:
Of course he's class for his age and we all know his massive potential but he wasn't anywhere near as good in last nights game to warrant half the comments drooling over him.
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I thought he was very good. His pace and intelligent movement were very threatening to our defense. The fouls that we need to made on him, the stupid Di Maria who decided to pick up the ball when Mbappe was through onside, and few chances that he got from through ball and almost scored & of course the goal he scored.
 
Top French scorers in Champions League - Kylian #10 with 14 goals

 
It's not often that I go to OT and see a single guy visibly frighten our players, especially not a youngster.

R9, CR7 (at RM), Bale (at Spurs) and young Messi are the ones I can think of from the top of my head.
 
VivaObertan said:
It's not often that I go to OT and see a single guy visibly frighten our players, especially not a youngster.

R9, CR7 (at RM), Bale (at Spurs) and young Messi are the ones I can think of from the top of my head.
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Henry
 
Sayros said:
That's because you're not taking into account the difficulty of yesterday's job. Mbappe would have seen a lot more of the ball and created far more danger had Cavani been healthy and he could have occupied one of the wings and start coming centrally and play off Cavani with Di Maria in support. He had to be shifted up front where he would most likely (and did) touch the ball far less than he normally does, with the whole defense focused on him, and he still managed to slip by and score one. That's extraordinarily difficult when the whole team is focused on you and you're playing a role where as soon as you touch the ball, you have 2-3 players on you. It's silly to complain he did 'feck all' when his role was never going to allow him to do what he usually does.
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Any excuse for players other than the ones in our team (assuming youre a United fan).

Not really bothered what Cavani or others do. What I did see is that he lost the ball quite often with sloppy passes and touches. Thats something players around him cant control.

Dont get me wrong because the next thing i'll have people saying I think hes average. Hes a tremendous player, but other than the goal, I didnt think he did much.
 
Walters_19_MuFc said:
Any excuse for players other than the ones in our team (assuming youre a United fan).

Not really bothered what Cavani or others do. What I did see is that he lost the ball quite often with sloppy passes and touches. Thats something players around him cant control.

Dont get me wrong because the next thing i'll have people saying I think hes average. Hes a tremendous player, but other than the goal, I didnt think he did much.
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And you are right by his own standards it was a quite game, by world class players standards it was also a quite game. Now the thing that I find interesting is that he is able to do what Cristiano Ronaldo has been doing in the last 3-4 years, stay at the periphery of the game but still represent a threat and actually impact the game with a goal.
 
Walters_19_MuFc said:
Did feck all for most of the game, but a goal seems to sway peoples minds. Yes, as a striker, he's ultimately going to be judged on goals, but his general wasnt good yesterday.
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He did his job, which was to occupy our defenders and drag them across the pitch. Notice how every time Di Maria got the ball he seemed to be in acres of space?
 
11101 said:
He did his job, which was to occupy our defenders and drag them across the pitch. Notice how every time Di Maria got the ball he seemed to be in acres of space?
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The movement that Lingard often gets criticized about?

Mbappes movement is fantastic but I was referring to his play on the ball.
 
Walters_19_MuFc said:
The movement that Lingard often gets criticized about?

Mbappes movement is fantastic but I was referring to his play on the ball.
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Movement of Lingard? Comparing that to a phenomenon like Mbappe his movement shits on Lingard, pff. To even mention those in the same breath.

I'm joking. But yeah. I think it is safe to say we have our next Messi or Ronaldo here. Nothing gets lunatics arguing against slight criticism like a fans of those guys.
 
Walters_19_MuFc said:
Any excuse for players other than the ones in our team (assuming youre a United fan).

Not really bothered what Cavani or others do. What I did see is that he lost the ball quite often with sloppy passes and touches. Thats something players around him cant control.

Dont get me wrong because the next thing i'll have people saying I think hes average. Hes a tremendous player, but other than the goal, I didnt think he did much.
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I'm not a United fan, but you missed the whole point of my post. He did exactly the job he was supposed to do, which is a thankless target-man sort of position where he's going to get the ball up top isolated for the most part and have 2-3 defenders trying to stop him from turning on the ball. It's two completely different roles compared to what he usually does, but he managed just fine. You're not gonna have anybody playing in that position that's going to dribble past everybody and spray passes around. So you're right, he didn't do much besides the goal, but that's all he was realistically asked to do. If he was more set on the wings, he'd have more space and time to make other things happen, just not in the role he had yesterday.
 
Sayros said:
I'm not a United fan, but you missed the whole point of my post. He did exactly the job he was supposed to do, which is a thankless target-man sort of position where he's going to get the ball up top isolated for the most part and have 2-3 defenders trying to stop him from turning on the ball. You're complaining that you didn't see the Mbappe that plays on the left or right wing with Cavani. It's two completely different roles, but he managed just fine. You're not gonna have anybody playing in that position that's going to dribble past everybody and spray passes around. So you're right, he didn't do much besides the goal, but that's all he was realistically asked to do. If he was more set on the wings, he'd have more space and time to make other things happen, just not in the role he had yesterday.
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I though he was supposed to be a striker? But he is a right sided forward like Martial is on the left?
 
MikeKing said:
I though he was supposed to be a striker? But he is a right sided forward like Martial is on the left?
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He would like to be a striker, but he made his trade as a left wing forward like Martial who got shifted to the right wing when he got to PSG. He will eventually be a leading striker though when Cavani leaves or whenever Mbappe moves on from PSG. My only point was that his role yesterday wasn't going to allow him to be able to do much, it was all about making the right run and getting on the end of whatever Di Maria or Draxler could come up with, especially with Alves on the right wing being more of a second defender to deal with Shaw and Martial. Very few touches, it's probably one of the game where he's had the least touch of his career with PSG but it worked out
 
Sayros said:
He would like to be a striker, but he made his trade as a left wing forward like Martial who got shifted to the right wing when he got to PSG. He will eventually be a leading striker though when Cavani leaves or whenever Mbappe moves on from PSG. My only point was that his role yesterday wasn't going to allow him to be able to do much, it was all about making the right run and getting on the end of whatever Di Maria or Draxler could come up with, especially with Alves on the right wing being more of a second defender to deal with Shaw and Martial. Very few touches, it's probably one of the game where he's had the least touch of his career with PSG but it worked out
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Wow. Sound like without the goals he had a poor game.
 
MikeKing said:
Wow. Sound like without the goals he had a poor game.
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He did. In that role, if you're not scoring the goal there isn't much else you'll do to positively affect the game. Marquinhos, Silva, Veratti, and Di Maria had much better games. If Cavani would have been healthy, I'm sure Mbappe would have had a much better game from the right wing going at Shaw instead of having a couple of defenders right on him as soon as he touched the ball. But someone had to fill that role and it's pretty great that at his age he's capable of filling a multitude of roles and still make an impact.
 
Apett from that one offside shot he was barely involved in the 1st half. He had the least touches of anyone bar DDG even and even 2nd half the same but the top players take their chance and he done that.
 
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