Jude Bellingham came to the defence of Kylian Mbappe after the forward’s nightmare performance at Anfield in Liverpool’s 2-0 win over Real Madrid.
The France star missed a penalty at 1-0 to compound a miserable game on Merseyside in which he was shackled by Conor Bradley and Ibrahima Konate throughout.
With Vinicius Junior missing due to injury, the pressure was on Mbappe to perform in his more favoured wide-left attacking role, but he looked a shadow of his best self as Liverpool claimed a convincing win through goals from Alexis Mac Allister and Cody Gakpo.
Former Real Madrid and Liverpool winger Steve McManaman accused Mbappe of failing to step up when his team needed him the most in the absence of several injured stars.
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“They needed him tonight,” he told TNT Sport. “Without Vinicius, without some of the other stars, they needed him to do something. He flattered to deceive, and that was his moment. That was his moment.
“The Madrid press, they’ll be quite ruthless tomorrow, and they’ll be ruthless about Kylian because he just didn’t deliver again when they needed him to.
“Madrid are going through a rough patch at the moment, and the big players are not playing well, so that shines a light on him even more. Vinicius is not here. Will Kylian step up tonight? No, he won’t.”
Mbappe’s teammates were quick to stand by him, though. Bellingham made it clear that the missed penalty was not the reason behind their defeat, even if it came at a critical moment.
“It’s a big moment in the game, but it can happen. He’s a wonderful player, but the pressure given how good he is is huge,” he told BT Sport.
“The penalty’s not the reason why we lost the game. As a collective, we weren’t good enough. Kylian can keep his head high. I know for sure he’ll produce many more moments that are huge for this club.
“To be fair, from the first minute, they took control of the game. We never really maximised the spells we had in possession. They were more up for it than us, which is really disappointing to say. It’s a bad result against the best-performing team in Europe. It’s no disgrace, but it’s a bad result.”
Luka Modric told Movistar that Mbappe is “training well and with confidence” and stressed that things would eventually click.
“Sometimes, it doesn’t work out, like today with the penalty,” he said. “But we have confidence in him and I’m sure Kylian will end up doing what is expected of him.”
