Kylian Mbappe may be on his way out of the French capital, but as long as he is in the starting lineup for Paris Saint-Germain, they will remain a dangerous team.
The World Cup winner showed that on Tuesday as he scored two fine goals in a 2-1 win over Real Sociedad, sending PSG back into the Champions League quarter-finals for the first time in three seasons.
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“We knew straight away that we couldn’t go to sleep,” Mbappe said after the match. “If they had started the scoring, they would have gone on with the support of their fans. We had to dash their expectations early on.
“That’s what we did, and we’re very happy to be back in the quarterfinals.”
PSG advanced 4-1 on aggregate, with Mbappe also scoring a goal in the 2-0 win in the first leg in Paris three weeks ago. ESPN have reported that Mbappe has already told PSG that he will not be staying with the club after this season, with a move to Real Madrid looking almost certain.
Despite spending heavily trying to win the Champions League for the first time, PSG had been eliminated from the last 16 five times in the past seven seasons, including the last two. They made it to the semi-finals in 2021 and were runners-up in 2020.
“We wanted to qualify, but we also wanted to win,” Mbappe said. “We had a game plan that was clear, and we were able to score early. We didn’t get under a lot of pressure, just a little pressure at the end.”
Despite his heroics against Sociedad, Mbappé had not scored in his last two appearances, a pair of draws with Rennes and AS Monaco, and suffered defeats in both of those games – prompting a move to Luis Enrique, To which ESPN sources said he was not successful. Good with your star player.
But Mbappe played until the final whistle on Tuesday and reiterated after the game that there were no problems between him and the PSG coach.
“There is no problem with him, even if people think there is a problem,” Mbappe said. “I have problems, but coach isn’t one of them.”
Luis Enrique put it even more succinctly: “I have no problems with any player.”
“He can score 50 goals and give 25 assists with any coach,” the PSG coach said. “For me he is the best player in the world in the final third, unstoppable. Today he also showed that when the game situation requires it he can hold the ball and then attack in the open field.”
With his two strikes against Sociedad, Mbappé became the second-youngest player to reach 45 Champions League goals in the group stage and knockout games at the age of 25 years and 76 days. Lionel Messi reached this milestone at the age of 24 years and 257 days and Mbappé now has 46 goals.
Information from the Associated Press was used in this story.
