In the time of big data and artificial intelligence, from the multitude of companies and specialists that detail soccer with a robotic obsession, some players resist the growing dehumanization of the game.
They are not classifiable.
They transmit so much superiority that they are out of the catalog.
They cannot even be described as stars, because their range is only found in a handful of chosen ones, footballers who transcend eras because their talent is beyond compare.
This is the case of Kylian Mbappé.
Of course you can analyze Mbappé with microscopic detail.
The data will record his unusual power and speed, inform us of his preferred areas of action, reveal his defensive involvement (or lack thereof), the number of explosive efforts per game, his staying power, the variety of goals he scores and so to infinity.
At this point, the volume of information about Mbappé is exhaustive.
It is more than scanned and yet its impact is uncontrollable.
What is it called and how do you measure what escapes the government from the figures?
How to classify Pelé and Maradona?
There's no way to get these people into a log file.
They fly too high and allow us to think that football is still magical territory.
They fascinate because they return us to a childlike wonder.
It is clear that Mbappé belongs to this privileged redoubt.
It is the second World Cup for Mbappé, who will turn 24 this month, a sign of his precocity, another common aspect in the great football phenomena, who do not understand age.
They arrive and dominate.
That Mbappé who emerged in Monaco and destroyed Manchester City in the European Cup was dominant.
And he was the player who changed the pace for France in the World Cup in Russia.
When the going got tough, and that happened in multiple games, the team found refuge in the prodigious qualities of its youngest player.
He didn't look like it on the field.
He played with the wisdom and propriety of those who are born taught.
Four years later, Mbappé occupies the first position on the football ladder, although the symbolic individual awards resist him.
He has not won the Ballon d'Or and one day we will wonder why it took him so long to achieve it, but in objective terms he has been the most sought-after and sought-after player on the world scene for a long time.
In fact, he is much more than just a fabulous footballer.
He has become a matter of State, as happened with Pelé in Brazil.
In the same way that President Sarkozy suggested to Michel Platini that he change his vote and decide on Qatar in the election of the host of the 2022 World Cup, Emmanuel Macron intervened in the Mbappé negotiating process that ended with the renewal of his contract for PSG and the rejection of Real Madrid.
When politicians say that football should stay out of politics and they stay so wide, they make you laugh.
This World Cup proposes something special.
The main stars of the favorite teams respond to expectations.
Mbappé, Neymar, Kane and Messi, each in their own way, stand out with a special shine.
Such a forceful and closed star competition is not remembered.
In the round of 16 they dazzled, but none offered such an indisputable feeling of authority as Mbappé, of whom everything is known, except the magical distance that separates the great footballers from the inexplicable phenomena.
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