Real Madrid are usually the first club in line when the opportunity arises to sign a megastar.
From Alfredo Di Stefano to Ferenc Puskas and Cristiano Ronaldo to Zinedine Zidane, the 14-time European champions have made a habit for decades of pulling off statement transfers. Adding Kylian Mbappe to yet another burgeoning superteam would arguably be the boldest of all — and not just because of the France captain’s exceptional ability.
A deal to prise Mbappe out of Paris Saint-Germain would be a resounding display of financial and sporting power from Madrid. It is a saga which has already dominated another summer transfer window, after the 24-year-old forward informed the Ligue 1 champions he will not trigger an extension clause in his contract, throwing his future with hometown club PSG into doubt.
Signing Mbappe would be a flexing of Madrid’s muscles for sure, but how would they fit someone who could well be the greatest footballer on the planet today into a squad already boasting some of the world’s best players?
Boiling it all down, Mbappe would be a direct replacement for the departed Karim Benzema.
The Ballon d’Or winner last October in what turned out to be his final season with Madrid, Benzema contributed 354 goals and 165 assists across a glittering 14 seasons in the Spanish capital — finishing in second place on the clubs’ career goals list, behind only Cristiano Ronaldo.
He also said goodbye as a hero because of his selflessness in attack, quietly conducting football’s most exclusive front line as Galacticos came and went around him. From playing a supporting role to Ronaldo to taking centre stage with Vinicius Junior under his wing, the now 35-year-old was the glue that allowed Madrid to keep on winning through testing times of change.
Vinicius Jr became one of the most devastating wide players in world football while playing alongside Benzema, and the striker’s replacement at the Bernabeu must continue to nurture the Brazil winger. Benzema would drift out to the left to combine with Vinicius Jr in the build-up, while also posing a threat in the penalty area when the South American waltzed to the byline with the ball at his feet.
Vinicius Jr dribbled into the area on 140 occasions last season — 53 times more than any other player in Europe’s big five leagues.
An elite finisher with clever box movement, neat link-up play in tight spaces allows Benzema to flourish close to goal.
Here against Almeria in April, for example, after Vinicius Jr dances past his full-back and into the area, Benzema’s elusive movement makes all the difference.
Charging into the box, he first makes a move towards the front post, which a back-tracking Rodrigo Ely spots with a glance over his shoulder…
…before rapidly switching directions and ghosting in behind the same defender, who has committed to that first movement, for Vinicius Jr to provide a simple assist after another fine dribble.
Or here against Liverpool two months earlier, where Benzema drifts away from the central space to play a quick one-two with Vinicius Jr…
… dragging Jordan Henderson towards him to create the space for the Brazilian to cut inside and curl an unstoppable effort into the far corner.
More than anything, a big-money replacement for Benzema should be able to pick their moments, when to occupy the central defenders, or to move closer to Vinicius Jr to bring him into the game.
While Mbappe is best known for his blistering runs in behind defences and ruthless finishing, a look at the numbers suggests he is considered in his build-up contributions, regularly dropping deep to provide lay-offs for team-mates to keep the play moving.
Using smarterscout’s player comparison tool, an algorithm that gives players a data-driven rating between zero and 99 on various aspects of their game, there are key similarities between Mbappe’s profile and that of the cultured striker he would be looking to replace if he does join Madrid.
Benzema’s perfect score of 99 for link-up play volume, a metric that tracks the proportion of a player’s attacking touches that are passes and do not take their team 10 metres or more upfield, confirms he was regularly involved in build-up play last season, rarely giving the ball away (95 in ball retention ability).
While not quite as strong, Mbappe’s scores of 86 and 83 for those metrics point to a player who can be patient and precise with his distribution, drifting into pockets of space to combine with his team-mates — which would make him a seamless fit for the Benzema role at Madrid.
Key differences between the two Frenchmen arise when it comes to more direct play, with Mbappe scoring much higher in his dribbling and progressive passing ratings. In other words, he will follow up a simple pass with a powerful run or penetrative forward pass much more often than his older compatriot.
The below example, against Troyes in May, illustrates one of his most devastating moves, dropping deep to combine before spinning away and careering forward into space.
Peeling away from the home side’s centre-backs, Mbappe drops into midfield to receive a line-breaking pass from Danilo Pereira, cushioning the ball in to Lionel Messi.
Wasting no time, he now charges into the area and receives the chipped return from Messi, drawing a good save from the goalkeeper.
Such an injection of pace and quick movement in central areas would make Mbappe a lethal addition to the Madrid attack, able to tear through defences from central areas in a way few other players in world football can.
A similar example of sharp link-up play came two weeks later as PSG secured the Ligue 1 title away to Auxerre, with Mbappe once again showing that he is intelligent and incisive in tight spaces, able to combine with team-mates with crisp passes before crashing into the penalty area and finishing emphatically.
Mbappe making his defender dance ???????? pic.twitter.com/8vjzENHo2J
— Ligue 1 English (@Ligue1_ENG) May 21, 2023
Or take this moment against eventual runners-up Lens in April, where Mbappe produces a sublime backheeled assist for Messi.
He hardly needs to prove it, but the 24-year-old clearly has the talent to play front and centre in this Madrid team.
He offers frightening transitional potential too, as one of the quickest players in the game. For a Madrid side who often like to soak up pressure and then pounce on the counter-attack, Vinicius Jr and Mbappe are two of world football’s most efficient full-pelt decision-makers.
Bringing that Benzema-esque link-up play, but also unrivalled destruction through hard-hitting, direct attacking, Mbappe’s forward momentum would unlock even more routes to goal for a team already brimming with attacking talent.
One of the main worries with Madrid’s potential signing of Mbappe is that he likes to play in many of the same zones that Vinicius Jr does. The two of them would surely be fighting to be the superstar winger of the team, taking on full-backs and cutting infield from the left.
Well, not so much. Their respective touch maps for last season reveal Mbappe is far from the sort of touchline-hugger who would interfere with Vinicius Jr’s running power, instead taking up relatively similar positions to Benzema.
While there is a clear preference for the left-hand side, Mbappe still has a significant presence in central areas, and is crucially most active in those valuable half-space positions from which Benzema combined so effectively with Vinicius Jr.
Madrid are less structurally rigid than other top teams, allowing their players greater positional freedom to bunch together, particularly around Vinicius Jr. This allows them to overload certain areas of the pitch and produce quick, short passes to set their attackers free.
Mbappe’s tendency to float into a variety of areas on the left side of the pitch, where the majority of Madrid’s attacks are already being funnelled, means both he and Vinicius Jr would see plenty of the play. Which can only be a positive thing if you’re a Madrid fan.
What’s more, Madrid’s midfield is very much geared to both dealing with the defensive strain of this lop-sided attacking system and contributing to its potency, boasting elite ball carriers and also ball winners able to lock down the left flank.
Eduardo Camavinga often played a hybrid left-back/left-midfield role last season. An exceptional athlete with a huge appetite for a tackle, he averaged 10.8 true tackles per 1,000 opposition touches — a metric that combines tackles, fouls committed while tackling and failed challenges to measure defensive tenacity. Only one player in La Liga with more than 900 minutes played, Rayo Vallecano’s Oscar Valentin, was more intense in his attempts to win the ball.
Camavinga also averaged 7.3 progressive passes per game last season, along with 3.1 take-ons, combining his immense defensive numbers with an ability to move the ball closer to Vinicius Jr. That combination was particularly successful in the first leg of their Champions League semi-final at home to Manchester City. Camavinga locked down the left-hand side with five tackles, and also escaped the press and carried the ball 40 yards to assist Vinicius Jr for the opening goal.
With so much focus on Madrid’s left side, it can create opportunities elsewhere for Federico Valverde to charge forward, often allowing the right-sided Uruguay midfielder to drift into central areas and attack the box to devastating effect.
A look at one of Madrid’s pass networks, from a 2-0 win over Celta Vigo in April, reveals how the team can function with two left-sided attackers.
This was a game in which Benzema had five shots on goal and Vinicius Jr attempted 15 dribbles and made three key passes, yet it was Madrid’s right-winger Marco Asensio who won man of the match after scoring one goal and assisting the other while all Celta’s attention was drawn to the opposite flank.
Add the summer signing of Jude Bellingham to this equation — a tireless, box-to-box type who consistently covers more ground than most — and you have a dynamic midfield unit well-equipped to deal with any teams looking to exploit the space in behind an ultra-attacking duo on their team’s left side.
On paper, then, it seems to be a perfect fit, although Mbappe’s vocal frustration about his role in Paris has caused concern.
Bemoaning his central “pivot” role at the top of the PSG team, he has often cited international team-mate Olivier Giroud as his favourite strike partner and also said his ideal system was the one employed by France coach Didier Deschamps.
“I have a lot more freedom here,” Mbappe said of the role he gets to play for his country. “The coach knows that there is a No 9 like Olivier who sets the defence. I can walk around, go into space, ask for balls.”
At PSG, it was often Mbappe’s role to occupy defenders, while Messi and Neymar searched for space. More frustrating for him was a cautious midfield setup, with those players often hesitant to push forward due to the low defensive contributions from the team’s glittering front three.
A player who loves to fire passes in to his team-mates, initiate quick one-twos and spin away from pressure, Mbappe often found himself isolated whenever he dropped for the ball. With his attacking partners far apart, and PSG’s midfield sitting deep — as shown below in April’s game away to Nice — he often had few options to create.
While Mbappe would also need to operate centrally at Madrid, a more dynamic midfield backing him up should allow him greater freedom to roam and play those quick, short passes to onrushing players.
And even if he does need to play that dreaded pivot role, the boundless energy of Bellingham, Camavinga and Valverde will allow for the kind of varied, slick combination play Mbappe likes, and help him become the “complete” player he so often talks about developing into.
Madrid coach Carlo Ancelotti has experimented with a diamond midfield structure anchored by Aurelien Tchouameni this pre-season, giving some of those players even more license to roam. In such a system, Mbappe could start in a front two with Vinicius Jr, allowing the two star forwards even more positional fluidity.
With so many options to help squeeze the best from a wealth of attacking players, Madrid would improve Mbappe as much as he would improve them.
All that is left is the small matter of stumping up the mountain of cash needed to acquire a player they have pursued for so long.
(Top photo: Ian MacNicol/Getty Images)
