Kylian Mbappe winning the Ballon d’Or won’t actually mean anything
This year’s Ballon d’Or promises to be the most fiercely contested in almost 50 years.
Kylian Mbappe, Harry Kane, Ousmane Dembele and Lamine Yamal are all vying to be crowned the world’s best player next month with the contest set to make history no matter what happens. The award last saw such a close run-off in 1977, when Allan Simonsen, Kevin Keegan and Michel Platini fought it out for the accolade where just four points separated the final podium. Campaigning has rarely played any part in the process. Even at the height of Lionel Messi and Cristiano Ronaldo’s seesaw battle that lasted a full decade, on-field form continued to dictate which of the pair finished in the top and runner-up spots.
But Mbappe has changed all that in the build-up to the ceremony taking place outside Paris for the first time since its 2016 return with a relentless PR drive in a desperate attempt to convince those tasked with voting for the winner that he rightfully deserves the Ballon d’Or more than Kane, Yamal or reigning holder Dembele.
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Kylian Mbappe’s PR offensive threatens to reshape Ballon d’Or
According to the Real Madrid forward, no one enjoyed a better 2025/26 than him despite finishing empty-handed for club and country. He wouldn’t be the first Ballon d’Or winner in recent history, let alone of all time, to win it from that position. Ronaldo himself claimed the 2013 honour after enduring his own trophyless season at the Bernabeu. But Mbappe’s insistence on pushing the envelope by filling every possible space in the news cycle with various justifications has veered into bizarre territories.
The fact he would vote for himself if he could, in a contest chosen entirely by journalists, is apparently considered a ringing endorsement. So, too, was a latest bout of electioneering that cited an upbringing ‘steeped in African culture’ and a recent visit to Cameroon as further reasons why the continent’s eligible correspondents should be backing him. Such is the shambolic nature of Mbappe’s press tour that AI-generated screenshots depicting him being interviewed in a bathtub by a French YouTuber recently went viral despite nothing of the sort actually taking place.
Mbappe’s supreme self-confidence in his powers of persuasion is understandable if somewhat misguided.
He finished as the World Cup‘s Golden Boot winner as well as the tournament’s all-time top scorer, pipping Messi despite reaching a third final in the past four editions, but missed out on a bronze medal to Kane and England in a chaotic third place play-off. His combined goal involvements for France and Madrid clocked in at 57 from 52 appearances – but it still paled in comparison to Kane’s haul of 75 goals and assists in 58 matches for Bayern Munich and the Three Lions. The fastest-ever player to rack up 100 Bundesliga strikes also won a German league and cup double while eliminating Mbappe’s Real Madrid from the Champions League knockout stage.
Despite injury issues limiting his impact at the World Cup this summer, Yamal also has taken aim at Kane. The teenager managed to produced 44 goal involvements in 53 games and play a key part in two trophy-winning teams with Barcelona and Spain. He believes the Ballon d’Or should not simply go to trophy winners or ‘a player who has scored 80 goals’.
But Mbappe has already made clear that he is not pushing to win for personal gain, rather out of a sense of duty as ‘the award belongs back at the Bernabeu’. Los Blancos and Barca players have won the award 12 times apiece in their own right – more than any other club – but that has not stopped the former from proudly displaying 17 iterations of the trophy, including those won by players prior to their moves, including Kaka and Michael Owen, also showcased in reflected glory.
Already reigning supreme with the most Champions League titles, Madrid now want to become the outright leaders in Ballon d’Or successes. A sense of unfinished business also hangs over Mbappe’s never-ending propaganda push. Scars from the 2024 award, when Rodri gazumped Vinicius Jr after driving Spain’s European Championship triumph, remain raw over two years on. The Brazil international and his teammates boycotted the ceremony in disgust at the perceived theft despite the final vote confirming he had finished 41 points behind the then Manchester City playmaker.
Kane’s reluctance to talk up his Ballon d’Or prospects only strengthens his case
Vinicius responded to the disappointment by defiantly claiming he would win it “10 times if I have to”, hinting that it represented a greater personal achievement than his man-of-the-match display at the pinnacle of European club football and potentially anything he would achieve on the international stage. It’s an obsession which has become so all-consuming that it has become detrimental to his on-field exploits, which has a knock-on effect of dissuading those who previously voted for him.
Kane’s reluctance to talk up the prospect of a hometown coronation at the London Palladium, hosting the award’s 70th anniversary away from its spiritual home, only strengthens his case alongside the tangible evidence left out on the pitch. Now 33 and still at the peak of his powers, it is difficult to root against the Bayern marksman.
United States head coach Mauricio Pochettino has even gone against his creed by tipping his ex-Tottenham lieutenant over Messi, who retains support from his Argentina teammates and Inter Miami co-owner David Beckham to claim the award for a record-extending ninth time.
The 33-year-old knows how cheap talk can be, having extinguished laughable talk of him being a ‘one-season wonder’ to become the Premier League‘s all-time leading scorer prior to his move to Germany, and is not defined by whether or not he wins the Ballon d’Or this year or in any other of his remaining career. Kane is merely another pawn in the latest instalment of what has become football’s annual popularity contest.
Whoever is crowned as the game’s new crème de la crème in the English capital will still be fiercely disputed by various factions. It has been the case ever since the Messi-Ronaldo duopoly shifted the dynamic of what the award is supposed to represent.
Mbappe prevailing would not confirm anything other than the best way to win a Ballon d’Or moving forward is to just do all your talking away from the pitch.
