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Arsene Wenger's First Impression Of Kylian Mbappe Proves How Talented He Is

Arsene Wenger's First Impression Of Kylian Mbappe Proves How Talented He Is

The PSG forward is already a World Cup winner aged 20 and there doesn't look like there's a limit to how good he can be.

Ryan Sidle

Ryan Sidle

Kylian Mbappe is pretty good but just how good can he be? Arsene Wenger revealed he knew the Frenchman was going to be special the first time he saw him play.

Most of us were introduced to Kylian Mbappe properly when Monaco were surprising everyone in the last 16 of the Champions League to knock Manchester City out back in 2017.

Just two years later and the Frenchman is now one of the most recognisable footballers on the planet and aged just 20 is one of the best players in the world, and already a World Cup winner.

Last week the PSG forward, who cost around £150 million last summer, was again impressing as he ripped Manchester United apart in the same competition and same round as he dispatched their local rivals two years earlier.

All the more impressive this time round was the absence of Neymar and Edinson Cavani in the Parisiens forward line, adding extra pressure to Mbappe's shoulders as the main striker.

The question now is just how good can the World Cup winner be?

Talking on the red carpet at Monday's Laureus World Sports Awards Arsene Wenger revealed what he thought the first time he saw the striker saying:

"The first time I saw Mballe I thought that we had a Pele in France."

Mbappe became Monaco's youngest ever scorer. Image: PA Images
Mbappe became Monaco's youngest ever scorer. Image: PA Images

That's saying something. Pele is often regarded as one of the best players ever, along with Diego Maradona, Johan Cruyff, Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo, and scored a lot of goals in his career.

The Brazilian does come in for criticism sometimes though. His claims of how many goals he scored is often questioned because of the quality of the Brazilian league and the nature of some of the games being friendlies.

Pele is often mocked for his 'fake' achievements and Mbappe is even mirroring him in those ways as he celebrated his 100th goal in training last week:

The 20 year old was one of the nominees for the Sportsman of the Year at the Laureus awards but was beaten to the award by Novak Djokovic.

Wenger was at the awards to pick up his lifetime achievement award, something that Mbappe can expect to get his hands on in the future if he lives up to the former Arsenal manager's prediction- it'll be a while yet.

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Topics: Football News, Ligue 1, PSG, French football, Arsene Wenger, Monaco, Ballon d'Or, Champions League, Kylian Mbappe, World Cup