Doesn’t time fly? Kylian Mbappe is now into his fourth season of senior football and has only just turned 20, which means we can no longer call him a teen sensation.
The Paris Saint-Germain ace has grown up fast and has already collected a number of team and individuals honours, including the World Cup.
Paris Saint-Germain star Kylian Mbappe at the Ballon d’Or awards.
It’s been an astonishing rise from teen talent to Ballon d’Or contender and, not only this, he’s one of the most loved players in the game.
Whether its supporters, team-mates, opponents, coaches, or football legends, the great and the good are all big fans of Mbappe.
But what have they said about the birthday boy? talkSPORT.com takes a look…
Didier Deschamps (France manager)
“What he can do at such a young age is not normal. You can’t put him in any category. A player like him only appears occasionally. I’m privileged because he’s French and he plays with us. There are a lot of Kylians, but only one Kylian Mbappe.”
Gianluigi Buffon (Paris Saint-Germain team-mate)
“If he maintains the desire to be number one, to be a great champion and humility to work to improve, he will have an incredible career ahead of him. And when I say incredible, I mean one of the best in history.”
Buffon passes on advice to his young team-mate
Thierry Henry (Monaco manager)
“I don’t like comparing players – Mbappe has to become Mbappe and that is all. But my word, he is good. Ooh la la. I really like watching him play.”
Antoine Griezmann (France team-mate)
“Kylian reminds me of Cristiano (Ronaldo) when he was in Manchester. When Kylian does what Cristiano did in Madrid, thinking only about scoring, then he will do the same. He will be scoring 50 goals per season.”
Griezmann and Mbappe kiss the World Cup
Pele (Brazil legend)
“Only the second teenager to have scored a goal in a World Cup Final! Welcome to the club – it’s great to have some company!”
Paul Pogba (France team-mate)
“Kylian has much more talent than I have. Do you see what he is doing at his age? No, I never had his talent.”
Pogba and Mbappe celebrate winning World Cup 2018.
Jurgen Klopp (Liverpool manager)
“I love him. I saw videos of him when he was 17 and he destroyed defensive lines as he is doing now. He’s an outstanding player, that’s clear, but he can deliver, deliver and deliver. What a player, what a player.”
“Mbappe is a nice player, very fast; but there are a lot of fast players, the difference is he can be both fast and effective at the same time. Whatever he does, he’s very effective. He is a no-frills guy, a very direct player. And therefore, very dangerous.
“He is very young, he will definitely be a star in the next few years.”
“Mbappe is not surprising me at all, I’ve seen him work every day since he was 17 and it was obvious. We know he’s a player of great quality with a spectacular future ahead of him.”
Jardim coached Mbappe in the south of France.
Florentino Perez (Real Madrid president)
“Zidane saw him when he was 16 years old. Zidane liked him a lot. Mbappe has some very good ways and surely he’ll become one of the greatest.”
Christophe Dugarry (Ex-France international)
“The boy is a centre forward and must be France’s spearhead for the next 10 or 15 years. He’s a number nine. He’s our Michel Platini, our Zinedine Zidane. He’s the player for our future.”
“When Kylian was 17 and playing for Monaco, his numbers were incredible. When the numbers are there at that age, it means that there is efficiency on top of very young talent – this proves that he is part of the group of five or six top players that will soon dominate the world.”
Draxler with his team-mate Mbappe.
“It’s hard to say [if he has a weakness], he’s already a world-class player but he’s now 19 or 20 years old so to win the Ballon d’Or he needs some more experience, but he’s still so young. If he continues like this he will win it one day. I’m sure. Because I’ve never seen a player of his age who played as good as he is currently playing.”
Vadim Vasilyev (AS Monaco’s vice-president)
“When you talk to him you don’t talk to a 19-year-old boy, you talk to a 30 or 25 year-old at least. There’s the maturity. Trying to find a weak point, I can’t.”
David Ginola (Ex-France international)
“He is very special. He is very young and I’m very surprised to see so much maturity from a kid of this age. For any club to have a player like him upfront – he can change the entire game with just one move.”
This story was originally published by talkSPORT
via USAHint.com
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