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Kylian Mbappe breaks 65-year French scoring record.
Kylian Mbappe is paid about £14 million per year to wear the Nike boots that he used to score his 54th goal of the 2022/23 season, a record for any Frenchman in a single season.
Just Fontaine set the previous record in 1957/58 while wearing borrowed boots and scoring three of his 53 goals.
Fontaine’s single-season score has not been surpassed in 65 years, with Michel Platini, Zinedine Zidane, and Thierry Henry all falling short of the Moroccan-born striker.
Mbappe shares Fontaine’s quick feet – whatever is covering them – and is the same age as his predecessor when he was at his prime (24) but has an entirely different profile.
Fontaine was forced to change his footwear during the 1958 World Cup partly because he wasn’t expecting to play a significant role in the tournament. In the training camp ahead of the games in Sweden, Fontaine admitted: “I am our centre-forward only till [Raymond] Kopa arrives.” The then Reims striker was afforded a start in the opening game against Paraguay because Rene Bliard picked up an injury.
Mbappe, on the other hand, was named France captain in March and wields such power at his club that he has felt necessary to explain that PSG is not Kylian Saint-Germain.
Just Fontaine’s goals in 1957/58
| Competition | Team | Games | Goals |
|---|---|---|---|
| French Division 1 | Reims | 26 | 34 |
| Coupe de France | Reims | 6 | 5 |
| International friendly | France | 2 | 1 |
| World Cup | France | 6 | 13 |
| Total | Reims & France | 40 | 53 |
France thrashed Paraguay 7-3 thanks to a hat-trick from Fontaine. It’s interesting that Fontaine, who concluded the 1957–1958 league season as the French top-flight’s leading scorer for the Stade de Reims squad that won the championship, arrived in Sweden with such a weak squad ranking.
Reims also won the 1958 Coupe de France, with Fontaine helping his team to a 2-1 victory over Nimes in the championship game. However, Bliard, a clubmate of Fontaine’s and an international opponent, scored twice that day.
In Bliard’s place, Fontaine and Raymond Kopa established a fearsome team, latching onto the future Ballon d’Or winner’s flurry of through balls each game as France advanced to the 1958 World Cup semifinals.
Despite scoring a goal against Pele’s Brazil, Fontaine’s team was unable to defeat the Seleçao. With four goals against West Germany in the third-place playoff, Fontaine brought his total for the tournament to 13, surpassing the record set by no other player in history.
Kylian Mbappe’s goals in 2022/23
| Competition | Team | Games | Goals |
|---|---|---|---|
| Ligue 1 | PSG | 34 | 29 |
| Champions League | PSG | 8 | 7 |
| Coupe de France | PSG | 1 | 5 |
| Nations League | France | 2 | 1 |
| European qualifiers | France | 4 | 4 |
| World Cup | France | 7 | 8 |
| Total | PSG & France | 56 | 54 |
Mbappe tried his best to beat Fontaine’s record with eight goals for France in Qatar – you have to spool back to Gerd Muller in 1970 to find the last man to net more in one World Cup.
However, while Fontaine found the net in every game in 1958, Mbappe fell dormant between the end of the last 16 and the closing ten minutes of the final. Yet, the jet-heeled forward sparked into life just at the right time, recording the second-ever hat-trick in the final of a men’s World Cup to force a penalty shootout against Argentina. Despite dispatching his own spot kick against chief irritant Emi Martinez, Mbappe ended an unforgettable night on the losing side.
Despite the fact that Mbappe topped the domestic scoring charts for the fifth consecutive season, winning his sixth Ligue 1 title in seven years at the age of 24, 2022/23 had the stink of disappointment.
Despite Mbappe’s seven goals in eight games, PSG were knocked out of the Champions League in the last 16, prompting Mbappe to lament the “shortcomings that we were going to end up paying for sooner or later.”
Following his “annus mirabilis,” Fontaine guided Reims to the 1959 European Cup final. The competition’s best scorer that year was Fontaine, who scored ten goals for the continent. Mbappe has never reached double digits in a single Champions League campaign. His old friend Kopa assisted Real Madrid in winning the championship.
Fittingly, Mbappe’s 164th league goal, which was also the number of goals Fontaine scored in his final 17 games before retiring due to injury, came at the end of the season in which he broke one of Fontaine’s records.
Mbappe will score a ton more goals in the future, possibly even more in a single season. But he won’t ever have Fontaine’s joyous surprise element and won’t ever score as many goals in borrowed boots.