The biggest reason to worry about Kylian Mbappe’s Real Madrid future
Real Madrid fans’ optimism surrounding a Kylian Mbappe transfer increased when they learned Barcelona could no longer hold onto Lionel Messi, meaning Messi will almost certainly be a PSG player (a deal has reportedly been reached). The idea is that Messi’s wages would force PSG’s hand, necessitating the sale of Mbappe one year before his contract runs out.
To this point, PSG’s Qatar ownership has made it clear that they have no intention of selling Mbappe. Before the Messi option surfaced, Mbappe told Mauricio Pochettino and the club that he would not be re-signing, but that still did not sway the Ligue 1 giants into opening negotiations with Real Madrid.
It would seem that signing Messi would make it impossible for PSG to hold onto Mbappe, but every major outlet in France is firmly maintaining the stance that the club will not sell to Real. And now, we have a very good hypothesis of why.
Speaking on El Transistor, Miguel Venegas stated that PSG are well aware they could be sanctioned by FFP for signing Lionel Messi, Achraf Hakimi, Gianluigi Donnarumma, Georginio Wijnaldum, and, of course, Sergio Ramos in the same transfer window without making sufficient sales to offset these purchases.
PSG have even more power and money than Real Madrid right now
However, Venegas says that PSG don’t care one bit. If they are sanctioned, the sanctions would happen down the road in three years. Since PSG have never won the Champions League and desperately need to in order to consider their sporting project a success, it sounds as if they are willing to take this gamble with FFP in order to win it all. And a squad with Messi, Mbappe, and Neymar leading the attack with the likes of Ramos and Marco Verratti behind them represents their best chance of taking home the trophy.
There’s also the matter of FFP, as enforced by UEFA, being an utter joke. Manchester City happily skipped past FFP. PSG are just as rich and powerful, and they are even more favored by UEFA after being one of the only two major clubs to not join the European Super League (Germany’s arch-monopolizers Bayern Munich being the other).
In fact, as much as LaLiga’s two main clubs have dominated spending and carried out their own unseemly power moves in Spain, Barcelona losing Messi represents by far the biggest consequence a club has faced in the modern era for overspending. LaLiga and Javier Tebas literally forced their hand, and they lost the best player in their club’s history at a time when they have been 100 percent reliant on him.
PSG do not have to deal with the same strict league as Real Madrid and Barcelona, nor do they have any constraints on how much they can spend since they are bankrolled by Qatar. They have a blank check to do whatever they want, and unless if someone stands in their way, it sounds like they are going to push the limits of their power by keeping Mbappe, Neymar, and Messi all together for 2021-2022.
And it’s that unchecked power that could prevent Real Madrid from signing the Galactico they have desperately wanted for two years.