Mbappé climbs back up at Real Madrid with Mourinho in charge

There was a night, May 14, when a good portion of the Santiago Bernabéu decided to boo one of the best soccer players on the planet. The uncomfortable detail is that the player in question was wearing a Real Madrid jersey. Kylian Mbappé, with the number 10 on his back, ran, sacrificed, kept trying, while part of his own fan base treated him as the sole culprit for a season fading away without any silverware. The team ended up winning 2-0 over Oviedo, but by then that hardly mattered. What stuck was the image of a forward rowing against his own crowd.

That climb, steep and strange, is one Mbappé still has to finish in this new chapter at the Santiago Bernabéu. And that is where the club's big bet comes in: that José Mourinho, now in charge on the bench, can bring the best version of Mbappé back out.

The only thing I can say about him is that he's a phenomenal player, and that I'm going to try to help him become even better.José Mourinho

The Portuguese coach said as much in an interview with Vanity Fair, no hedging. And it is not the first time Mourinho has had to rebuild a wounded star: he already did it, with some nuance, with his compatriot Cristiano Ronaldo between 2010 and 2013, also at Real Madrid. In his Netflix documentary he left a line that sums up his method: "I don't coach soccer players. I coach men who play soccer." The same Mourinho who has boosted careers has also been at the center of loud breakups, like the one with Iker Casillas. With Mbappé, it remains to be seen which side of the coach will show up.

Numbers that weren't enough to silence the critics

Is this really all about performance on the field? Hard to believe. Mbappé took home the Pichichi Trophy in both of his seasons in Spain: 31 goals in La Liga in 2024/25 and 25 last season, averaging 0.91 and 0.81 goals per game. He also finished as the top scorer of the most recent Champions League. With those numbers, any explanation that paints him as the main culprit for the team's trophyless season simply doesn't hold up.

One thing is missing from that picture: the injuries. A sprain in his left knee and a fiber tear kept him out of important matches right when the team had built up some momentum. During one of those absences, photos surfaced of him on a yacht with his partner, actress Ester Expósito, while the team beat Espanyol 2-0. It was the perfect fuel for a fan base that needed someone to blame after a season without titles, something that simply isn't tolerated at Real Madrid.

A shared fate

The night against Oviedo came in the worst possible context: Barcelona had just been crowned league champion after beating Real Madrid at Camp Nou, the team had been eliminated from the Champions League in the quarterfinals a month earlier, and on top of that, news had broken of an incident between Aurelien Tchouameni and Federico Valverde that left the Uruguayan, now the team's captain, in the hospital. Amid all that, Mbappé fired off a line after the match: "The manager said I'm the team's fourth-choice forward." Álvaro Arbeloa denied it afterward, though it was already known his time in charge was running out. Either way, the comment made clear just how deep the rift had grown.

A month later, the best version of Mbappé showed up again, this time wearing the France jersey at the 2026 World Cup, surrounded by teammates like Michael Olisé and Ousmane Dembelé. He was the tournament's top scorer for the second time in a row, something no player had ever done before, and became the all-time leading scorer in World Cup history with 22 goals, one more than Lionel Messi. All of that at just 27 years old.

I think it's very positive to have a coach like Mourinho, who knows how to win, who knows how to point the way to do it. Every player is thrilled to have a coach who knows where he's going, and that's very positive for us.Kylian Mbappé

Words help, but at Real Madrid, results are what count. And there is one title that has chased Mbappé since he arrived and that the club needs like air: the Champions League. Mourinho, who in his documentary summed up his understanding of success in one line ("How does it feel to win? Normal. That's what I've done my whole life"), looks like the man chosen to try to finally make that goal, and the reconciliation with his own fans, come true.