Kylian finished as the World Cup's top scorer for the second consecutive tournament, broke the all-time World Cup goalscoring record in just three World Cups compared to the previous record holder's six, and did it in 12 fewer matches. He'll likely have at least two more World Cups ahead of him, possibly even three, so he also has a realistic chance of breaking, or at least equaling the all-time World Cup assists record. That said, I'd actually bet on Olise being the one to break the assists record at the next World Cup.
Those records are inflated by the amount of games and the way the game is sped up nowadays. As they increase the amount of teams it's going to create more freak records. In a world cup that ended up with the team of teams winning the trophy, the individual record applause kind of falls on deaf ears. Mbappe will be the first player to score over a thousand goals and have the general consensus be the he is kind of an underachiever.
True even for previous era. The more games the more opportunities players had to break records. Not to mention the incentives put behind them compared to earlier players.
CR7 completely changed the way he played, are you kidding? The only argument there is that he was younger. Bale changed dramatically as well, though it would be more difficult to separate from dramatic improvement in nearly every facet of his game. And as you acknowledged, Benzema changed later in his career, first to press more, and then when CR7 left, to score more. From an interview last month with Le Parisien: “I have to take another step forward defensively. I’ve always been demanding of myself, and I think I need to improve in that area. It’s important for the team, and I’m going to do it,”
It's not that straightforward, average goals per game at the world cup was highest toward the beginning, then went down, then back up, but not dramatically. Pele and R9 averaged a bit under a goal/game, Messi significantly less than a goal per game, Mbappe has averaged a goal per game. True, though he also holds the record for goals in the knockout stage and they haven't expanded to 64 teams quite yet, only one tournament with 48.
Weird thing to criticise because of his record, but I would happily take less goals for a more clinical striker. The guy does seem to miss a lot of big chances and quite a few come back to haunt us and France.
I think Mourinho won’t like the production he gets from Mbappe for the 89 minutes he isn’t scoring. This is a guy who sold Ibrahimovic and gave the job to Milito. I think Mbappe’s major contribution next season might not even be goals, it will either be getting benched or getting Mourinho fired (maybe both).
And the Most Useless Goals of the Season award goes to... Great player but it was visible how France suffered with the guy moving AWAY from the goal and leaving the box more often than not. Sure, he won them games and scored some beauties, but what an awful season, really. His goals were completely useless.
literaly nothing achived since 2018 only regression as a player his abilities on the ball as a striker are laughable ...cant barely control a ball,pass or dribble
Not really if we're honest. Even if you view this world cup as a test subject, the games in which the big goal scorers failed to show up be it Spain with him and Messi, England for Haaland, and Argentina for Kane, they were completely shipped off the game barely making any strong impact. We didn't have a Higuain game where a player had the glory on his foot and didn't convert. We just saw the teams they all played for get conclusively shut out offensively.
I'm not talking about their overall contribution to the minute to minute game play, I'm talking about have golden chances to score and he's shooting straight at the keeper/straight up poor finishing.
I'm sorry I don't see it. It's just not an issue with the player to me, and the fact that he has insane numbers is the kind of proof you need, you don't get to have upwards of 40 goals as a poor finisher.
CR7 changed the way hes playing in order to score more goals. Mbappe already scores enough goals. And he already changed from a LW to CF. Its only Benzema that holds imo from your comparison, and this is not a good sign because hes a very different character to Mbappe. He can say whatever he wants. He does talking quite well. Even when Luis Enrique was giving him that speech he was nodding like yea I agree. Four years later zero change in that aspect.
Call me crazy but he's not the issue, and the truth is Tchouameni was criticized more by the French press for not being good enough than Mbappe. The lesson France took from the World cup was that the team needs a much better midfield to compete, and Tchouameni was sort of mentioned as a step down from former French standouts. When you have to measure up to guys like Viera, Kante, it's a different ball game.
Makes you think what Portugal's problem is. That stacked midfield looked like a mid-table midfield throughout the WC. Super underwhelming.
Portugal is a strange case. In addition to the coach being fairly mediocre in the first place, one of the problems is the inability, for whatever reason, of that same coach (and others before him) to drop a 41 year old Cristiano from the squad. However, now that the decision from above was made for Cristiano to be a lock, it seemed to me that this decision was heavily disliked internally within certain corners of the squad. For instance, I just couldn't shake the feeling that a player like Bruno absolutely hated that Cristiano was in the squad and starting (he gave a similar vibe when they played at United btw). To me, it just showed during games, as their attitude was a far cry from how the Argentina team fought for and basically worshipped Messi. And it's not that strange for the team to underperform if a certain key decision is not widely supported within the squad. For me, the first thing the new manager needs to do is drop Cristiano and move on. That squad is capable of winning a major tournament, but are held back in several ways.
I think Cristiano only just truly fell off in the last year. Besides obviously losing his physicality much earlier, he is now also missing chances he never used to miss. I think his nervous system is getting overloaded much sooner in games and it results in slower reaction times and poor decisions, which is common due to CNS fatigue that comes with age. Cristiano was never the same player after leaving us, even in Juventus where he was still a beast, he did not have the same output and results. By the time he went back to UTD he was dealing with personal trauma and a coach that had a vendetta. That on its own didn't bode well for him, but it was also obvious during this time that he'd be best used for 60 mins per game or as a substitute. He was still an elite player, just unable to give you a full game at the level needed. The problem is that with his status, minutes are almost non-negotiable. So that created additional problems and friction. Him going to Saudi was the right move, but his project "1000 career goals" is something that keeps driving his minutes even when he doesn't deserve them. Even at Al-Nassr I think some of his teammates feel like they've been conscripted into a "project 1000 goals" instead of being parts of a cohesive sporting project. Last Nation's League he was still a top goal scorer, and this was his 2nd title. That's nothing to scoff at at that age. But this World Cup was the first competition where I saw him and felt sad, because the GOAT has finally trully fallen off. I hope he retires from NT football, and gets his 1000th this coming season. He deserves his flowers.
An underrated factor is that as you age, the body regenerates slower so a tournament with a game every 2 to 3 days is just a bad idea from every angle really.
I don't think Mbappe is our problem, but I do see @Nathanial Essex point about him not being very cynical. Which again I understand it sounds crazy to say for a player that scores 40 goals a season but watching the games he plays and the chances he misses that's how I feel.