Paul Pogba has claimed that 19-year-old Kylian Mbappe is already more talented than him after the Paris Saint-Germain youngster put in one of the performances of the World Cup so far against Argentina on Saturday.
Mbappe scored France’s third and fourth goals in a thrilling 4-3 victory in Kazan, becoming the first teenager to score a World Cup brace since Pele in the 1958 final. His mazy run also won the penalty that Antoine Griezmann converted for the first goal of the game.
Pogbe dismissed comparisons between himself and Mbappe, both in terms of position and talent.
Kylian Mbappe is the first teenager to score more than once in a World Cup tournament since Michael Owen scored one in 2 separate games in 1998. Mbappe wasn’t born then. He’s also the first teenager to score 2 in a match since Pele v Sweden in the final of 1958.
— Gary Lineker (@GaryLineker) June 30, 2018
“Kylian has much more talent than I have,” he said, quoted by the Daily Mail.
Pogba and Mbappe have a lot in common. Both have been tipped as ‘the next big thing’ in French football, and both have been the subject of French transfer records.
Pogba became the most expensive player in world football when he joined Manchester United for £89m in 2016, before PSG paid £128m to bring Mbappe to the Parc des Princes last summer.
Pogba was also named Best Young Player at the 2014 World Cup and Mbappe must be in pole position to win that award this year after his dazzling display on Saturday.
His brace took his goal haul at the tournament up to three, after he became the youngest Frenchman ever to score at a World Cup by netting the winner against Peru in the group stages.
France will face Uruguay in the first match of the quarter finals next Friday in Nizhny Novgorod.
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