Philadelphia: Kylian Mbappe of France scored his 19th career World Cup goal, finding the net on a penalty kick in the Round of 16 against Paraguay Saturday and moving within one of record holder Lionel Messi of Argentina.
Mbappe stutter-stepped on his way to his 19th goal in 19 World Cup appearances, beating Paraguay goalkeeper Orlando Gill in the 70th minute to break a scoreless tie. France’s captain was awarded the penalty when Diego Gomez was called for tripping after a video review.
“I’ve said from the first day that he had the spirit. He gave all the athletic efforts,” France coach Didier Deschamps said after Les Bleus won 1-0. “He’s a great top-notch player on the pitch. But when he speaks, he speaks for the entire group.”
It was the seventh goal of this tournament for Mbappe, matching Messi in the race for the Golden Boot for the World Cup’s top scorer. Mbappe won that award four years ago in Qatar, but Messi and Argentina beat France in the final.
Mbappe is now the only player to score at least three goals in the knockout stage of three World Cups. On Saturday, he endured against perhaps the most physical opponent he’s faced in this tournament.
Tempers flared in the first half when Andres Cubas took down Mbappe and the teams briefly pushed and shoved each other. Matias Galarza also threw his right elbow into Mbappe and sent him crashing to the grass.
After Mbappe ignored Gill’s attempt at a postgame handshake, the goalkeeper threw a ball at the France star’s back.
“We knew what kind of match it was going to be. We can also get our hands dirty, we know how to do it,” Mbappe said in French. “We know how to play ugly football. Guess they were thinking we were going to show up in tuxedos, but we were ready. Even at that kind of game, we were better than them. That’s their style of football. There’s no right or wrong way to play the game. They tried to beat us that way, but we won.”
And the victory cleared the way for Mbappe to continue chasing Messi’s career goals mark.
Messi scored his 20th career World Cup goal in Argentina’s 3-2 win over Cape Verde on Friday night. The 39-year-old great also has goals in a record eight consecutive World Cup games.
Norway’s Erling Haaland and England’s Harry Kane are next in the Golden Boot race with five goals each.
If there’s a tie in the Golden Boot standings when the tournament ends, FIFA will use assists as the first tiebreaker and fewest minutes played as the second tiebreaker.
AP
