Monaco striker Kylian Mbappe has attracted some of the biggest sides in world football in the last few weeks, making the 18-year-old football’s most courted teenager.
The striker took Europe by storm last season, scoring 26 goals in all competitions in his first full season at senior club level.
Mbappe is one of the most sought after players in the summer transfer market in Europe.
While close followers of the emerging striker acknowledge his ability to carve out goals, not much of these people know that the hugely talented player has Nigerian roots, as a recent research by The PUNCH has shown.
Kylian’s father, Wilfred Mbappe, who has Cameroonian and Nigerian roots, was once a refuge, who migrated to France for greener pastures. According to reports, Wilfred in a bid to get a permanent stay got married to an Algerian-French lady Fayza, an ex-handball player.
Kylian was given a Yoruba middle name Adesanmi meaning “crown fits me” by Wilfred, who also adopted a son, Jirès Kembo Ekoko, a professional footballer of Congolese descent, but has a biological son and younger brother of Kylian named Adeyemi Mbappe, in recognition of his Nigerian roots.
Adeyemi is a Yoruba name meaning “the crown befits you.” Indeed, Adeyemi is the reason why Kylian celebrates his goals by posing with his arms crossed and thumbs up.
“This is how my younger brother celebrated when he beat me in the FIFA video game,” said Mbappe.
Wilfried works as coach at AS Bondy and he started training Kylian at the age of six. He also spends time coaching Adeyemi, while he is currently his Kylian’s agent.
Meanwhile, the Monaco star has also been linked as a grandson of Cameroonian midfield legend Samuel Mbappe Leppe. But findings by our correspondent has shown that the late Leppe, who played for Oryx Douala in the 1950s and 1960s, winning five league and three Cup title (1963, 1968 and 1970) and was the first captain to lift the African Champions Clubs’ Cup in the 1964/65 season, may not have any biological links with Kylian.
