France striker Kylian Mbappe ran riot in the second half of the round of 16 match with Poland (3-1) in the FIFA World Cup. He scored two spectacular goals to not only propel his side to the quarterfinals of the competition but also ended up breaking Pele’s goal-scoring record in the process.
The 23-year-old now possesses the most number of goals in the FIFA World Cup for any player below the age of 24. The Paris Saint-Germain superstar has already found the back of the net nine times in the competition, the most for a player his age.
Mbappe has more World Cup goals to his name than Diego Maradona, Cristiano Ronaldo and is now level with Lionel Messi on nine goals but has played in three World Cups less than the Argentine magician. The 23-year-old needs only eight more goals in order to become the highest goal-scorer in the history of the FIFA World Cup, overtaking Miroslav Klose’s tally of 16.
Olivier Giroud opened the scoring in the game against Robert Lewandowski’s Poland just before half-time. Mbappe’s first goal came in the 74th minute as he received the ball from Ousmane Dembele and shuffled his feet and slammed the ball into the near post top corner from the edge of the box.
In the first minute of injury time, he doubled his tally on the night with an even more audacious attempt as he curled the ball home into the far post top corner beating Wojciech Szczesny at full stretch. Eight minutes later, Lewandowski converted a penalty kick.
“Of course, this World Cup is an obsession for me, it’s the competition of my dreams. I have built my season around this competition and around being ready both physically and mentally for it. I wanted to come here ready and so far things are going well, but we are still a long way from the objective we set and that I set,”
Mbappe said after the game .
Thanks to his two goals, Mbappe has also taken the lead in the Golden Boot race and has five goals in this tournament so far.
