How long it took Kylian Mbappe to score 300 goals compared to Messi and Ronaldo | OneFootball

Highlights

Although France had just recorded their biggest ever victory in a 14-0 demolition of Gibraltar, it was Kylian Mbappé who made the headlines as he reached 300 career goals, at just 24 years old.

With 10 different goalscorers on the night, Mbappé managed to find himself a hat-trick of assists, as well as goals. The last goal, and the 300th one of his career, being a sensational 42-metre lob. It was a performance that was microcosmic of his career so far, and although it can be argued that it was just an international match against Gibraltar, it is performances like this that show that Mbappé is ready to be the captain of football in the post-Messi and Ronaldo era.

Kylian Mbappé; The story so far

Despite being just 24 years old, a few weeks shy of his 25th birthday, you have to go all the way back to the 2nd of December 2015 for Mbappé's first involvement in first-team football. At just 16 years old, Mbappé displaced Thierry Henry as Monaco's youngest ever player, having come on for Fábio Coentrão in the 88th minute against Caen. It was three months later that Mbappé would get his first goal in men's football, slotting away against ESTAC Troyes in the last minute.

Finishing his debut season with one goal and one assist, the 2016-17 season was a star-making year, with the forward finishing with 15 goals alongside eight assists. On top of this, he had six Champions League goals that season, with two coming against Manchester City and three against Borussia Dortmund, both ties that would see Monaco be victors. It was also this year that saw him make his France national team debut, coming on for Dimtri Payet against Luxembourg.

Coming off the back of his best season yet, interest was rife, and it was a loan move (that became a mandatory $180m purchase) to PSG that saw him leave Monaco at the beginning of the 2017/18 season. This move made him the most expensive teenager in football history, a title that was deserved, having seen just what he was capable of at Monaco.

In what must have been a day to remember, he went on to later score his first two international goals for France against the Netherlands in World Cup qualifying, justifying exactly why PSG bought him.

His debut season with PSG saw him finish with 13 Ligue 1 goals and eight assists, a statistical regression. However, this was a teenager who was bedding in with the likes of Neymar, Di Maria, Thiago Silva; world-class players. He was showing that he can hang with the best, and was doing so at just 18 years of age. It was this season that saw him also become the youngest player to reach 10 Champions League goals, again, proving he can do it on the biggest stage.

Mbappé was called up to the French team for the 2018 World Cup, and became the youngest French goalscorer in World Cup history when he scored against Peru in a 1-0 victory. He went on to have a Man of the Match performance against Argentina in the Round of 16, and scored a stunner against Croatia in the final, on his way to winning a World Cup at just 19 years old.

In 2018/19, Mbappé notched 33 Ligue 1 goals, a career best to this day, as well as seven assists. A serendipitous number of assists, as it was this season that he donned the infamous number seven for the first team, as he went on his way to become Ligue 1 Player of the Year.

Performances such as his record-breaking four goals in 13 minutes against Lyon, and hat-tricks against Guingamp and his former club Monaco, saw PSG win the Ligue 1 title, and saw Mbappé win the Kopa Trophy (best U-21 player in the world), and Ligue 1 Golden Boot.

His career isn't without its peaks and troughs, as it was the 2019/20 UCL campaign that showed Mbappé his first real major defeat, with PSG losing to Bayern Munich in the Champions League final, which to this day is the closest they have ever come. Perhaps a reason for his blistering form in the next campaign.

Over the next two seasons, Mbappé would continue his upwards trajectory, showing no signs of slowing down. He tallied 45 Ligue 1 goals and 13 assists in this time, he was also becoming a main player in the European competitions, with eight goals in the 2020-21 campaign being a career best for the attacker.

Starting 2020/21 to the end of the 2022/23 campaign, Mbappé went three consecutive seasons scoring over 25 goals in his league campaign, and has scored 21 Champions League goals in that time. He's won five Ligue 1 titles, and several Player of the Year trophies.

He has totalled 46 French national team goals, with two World Cup tournaments to his name, where he has been a standout player; most notably a performance against Argentina in the 2022 World Cup for the ages. He has played through speculation and rumours seemingly his whole career and yet is never hindered.

Mbappé reaches 300 goals quicker than elite strikers

It is this Mbappé, an Mbappé who has only gotten better every year since 2015, an Mbappé who doesn't shy from the biggest of stages, who has gotten himself 300 career goals at the age of just 24. To put this into perspective, it took Lionel Messi until 25 years old to achieve this feat, and took Cristiano Ronaldo until he was 27.

To further put this into perspective, when Cristiano Ronaldo was Mbappé's age, he had scored 158 career goals. A stat that not only proves how much better Ronaldo has become with age, but a stat that shows just how ridiculous of a football player Mbappé has been since he stepped onto a men's pitch.

With a career spread of 27 goals at Monaco, 227 goals at PSG, and 46 at France, Mbappé is showing no signs of stopping. His future is seemingly always hanging in the balance, so be it at PSG, or Real Madrid, or even in England, no matter where Mbappé finds himself, though, he always finds the net.