A relief if we see life in white but a tension if we see it in Blue. Kylian Mbappé moves very quickly on a football pitch and that’s also why Real Madrid signed him. But to preserve the interests of the Madrid White House, the captain of the France team is also in excess of speed to return from injury.
At the end of the calendar year, Mbappé, who had been playing for some time with knee pain, learned via an MRI that his internal ligament was affected. And in these conditions, the remedy is obvious: no match so as not to aggravate the problem. It was therefore decided that he would be put on rest for three weeks.
Except that to the surprise of many, Mbappé joined Saudi Arabia on Friday evening where his club will play this Sunday in the final of the Spanish Super Cup against eternal rival Barça. Just eleven days after the announcement of his injury…
On the Madrid side, we obviously welcome this express return. Mbappé, who has always trained daily with a physical trainer, has recently resumed more dense training with races and kicks on the ball. In his soul and conscience, the Madrilenian felt that the pain was bearable. So here he is placed at the disposal of Xabi Alonso, his coach. Officially, it is during the final training before the match that a decision will be made on his participation in the final. But it’s hard to imagine him having traveled six hours between Madrid and Jeddah if the decision had not already been made.
Salam Alaikoum, Saudi Arabia 🇸🇦📍
— Kylian Mbappé (@KMbappe) January 9, 2026
So much for common sense and the risk of worsening the injury. The situation is too complicated at Real not to throw the Mbappé coin in the air hoping that it will land on the right side. Xabi Alonso is in a complicated situation at Real and knows that his team is better with Mbappé than without him. And to beat Barcelona, it is better, for Alonso, to field his best player (18 goals in the league and nine in the Champions League this season) while he himself is increasingly challenged internally. In Madrid, the only totem of immunity is trophies and Alonso, more than others at the club, needs to lift the Spanish Super Cup to maintain credit. He does not have the luxury of thinking about the spring deadlines where it would be good for Mbappé not to arrive too diminished.
But on the side of the France team, this rush to put Mbappé back on the pitch is rather worrying. The fear is real that by not resting properly, he will injure himself more seriously and arrive weakened at the next World Cup. If he gets there. The only thing that can appease Didier Deschamps’ staff is that Mbappé has already refused to play under infiltration. This practice which consists of masking the pain but which wears out tired joints a little more.
Xabi Alonso, however, was less cautious. “Playing undercover? It’s a decision that we must make with the player, the technical staff and the doctors, he believes. We must always measure the risks, but we are not suicide bombers. » The Blues supporters especially hope that they are not apprentice sorcerers…
