Paris Saint Germain have been nothing short of a circus this season, and even during the season’s final few months, the drama continues to unfold.
The French heavyweights have been riddled with internal issues, from disharmony between the manager and sporting director to star players actively seeking a way out, things are quite messy at the Parc Des Princes.
The club did have a positive to clutch onto, as PSG managed to secure the future of Kylian Mbappe by extending his contract at the beginning of the season. But by the looks of it, relations with the talented Frenchman have started to turn sour as well.
It all came to light following an Instagram statement from the 24-year-old, a pretty damning one to say the least.
Upon translation, it read, ‘I have just taken part in viewing the club’s season ticket campaign for the 23/24 season. At no time was I informed of the content of the interview with my interlocutor. It looked like a basic interview in a club marketing day.’
The campaign the France international was referring to was the promotional video published by the club to advertise season tickets for the next season.
It placed a bit of emphasis on the World Cup winner, including a passionate monologue by him which ran for the duration of the video.
🎟️ Kylian Mbappé au centre de la campagne d’abonnement du @PSG_inside pour la saison 2023/2024.
Seuls les Titis, Nuno Mendes, les Ultras et… Jonathan Calderwood figurent sur cette vidéo. 😳
Evidently, Mbappe took issue with the attention placed on him, which he made clear through the rest of his statement: ‘I don’t agree with the video posted. That’s why I fight for individual image rights. PSG is a big club and family, but it is certainly not Kylian Saint-Germain.’
The determined words from the forward caught many fans off-guard, who found Mbappe’s motivations to be rather confusing.
Fans can’t understand why Mbappe called out PSG
Fans online reacted to Mbappe’s statement with a degree of skepticism, as the move came off as excessive and unnecessary.
But before we delve into fan opinions, it’s important to understand the potential reasons from Mbappe’s perspective.
The 24-year-old’s contract extension was surrounded by an insane amount of publicity, reports even stated that France’s President himself was involved in the negotiations.
These reports also suggested that the newly-drafted contract granted Mbappe operational authority over the club.
From signings to departures, the Frenchman supposedly had a say in it all.
Swayed by these reports, fans online quickly made a meme out of the whole affair, and some even began viewing Mbappe as PSG’s despotic dictator.
Naturally, no player wants such a tag looming over their heads, which might just explain his public statement on the video.
Mbappe directly utilizing the term ‘Kylian Saint-Germain’ adds further credibility to this theory. Although, it is just as possible that the Frenchman was miffed about his footage being used without his permission.
Nevertheless, fans found the statement to be rather illogical, especially since the promotional video featured various other PSG stars, and didn’t lean entirely on Mbappe.
Even the monologue was more likely to be interpreted as a Paris-born superstar heaping praise on his club’s culture. Instead of presenting the 24 year old as the club’s figurehead.
Fans also found Mbappe’s gate-keeping of his image rights to be very excessive and petty. After all, there really isn’t much of an issue in your own club using positive excerpts from an interview.
There were also suggestions that the statement was a PR move, directed at creating unecessary problems to eventually facilitate and justify a transfer away from the club.
