Kylian Mbappe has enjoyed a successful start to life at the Santiago Bernabeu, molding his game into more of an all-around striker at Real Madrid in order to help fellow superstar forwards Vinicius Junior and Rodrygo Goes continue to blossom on the wings.
At PSG, Mbappe formed a devastating one-two pairing with Neymar that reached a Champions League Final, but he found it more difficult to co-exist with the other superstars when Lionel Messi arrived in 2021.
Last season, Mbappe was the main man for PSG and helped lead the team to the Champions League semifinals, but he was often criticized by manager Luis Enrique for not defending enough or for not taking on additional burdens despite being, by far, the best player on a poorly-constructed side.
Real Madrid are already giving Mbappe much more organizationally support in the face of critics, and their group of leaders are a whole lot smarter about navigating the media.
Take, for example, star midfielder Fede Valverde’s recent interview with MARCA. The Uruguayan international is now one of Real’s key leaders, donning the No. 8 jersey after Toni Kroos’ 2024 retirement.
Valverde defended the forwards when discussing their responsibility to defend, and if you read between the lines, he’s most specifically shielding Kylian Mbappe from any unfair criticisms:
“There are players who don’t have to defend. Personally, I don’t mind running for our forwards, so they can take advantage of it. It’s good that (the forwards) help us, from time to time, but it’s like with the defenders: nobody expects them to attack for the whole 90 minutes.”
When Fede talks about “players who don’t have to defend”, he’s very likely invoking Mbappe. And as any Real Madrid fan will tell you, towards the end of his career, Mbappe’s idol Cristiano Ronaldo did not need to focus on defending.
In fact, Real Madrid don’t want these superstar attackers to waste their very valuable energy on defending needlessly if there is no chance of winning the ball or if the game state does not call for it.
Mbappe, Cristiano, and others of their kind can offer a team so much more by making game-changing attacking plays, which take a lot more energy to be explosive in one-on-ones.
Real Madrid know what they have in Mbappe, and while they appreciate any attacker – whether it is Mbappe, Vinicius, or Rodrygo – helping out, Fede is right that it isn’t their main job or expectation.
A lot of these pretenders out there who are quick to criticize Mbappe, including his own unsuccessful former coach who rode the coattails of an all-time great Barcelona side to fame, need to use logic for once and appreciate the comments Fede – a player who leaves it all on the pitch for his club – is making here.
The managing editor of The Trivela Effect, Kevin has 15 years of experience in digital media. He covered Real Madrid from 2019-2022 for The Real Champs as a site manager. His work has been featured in ESPN, Bleacher Report, Yahoo! Sports, NBC Sports, and other major outlets. You can contact him at the site’s official Twitter handle @TrivelaEffect or via the site’s official email thetrivelaeffect@gmail.com.