Kylian Mbappe has responded to French football president Noel Le Graet for saying that he wanted to quit the national team over his missed penalty at Euro 2020.
The 23-year-old saw his penalty saved in the shootout against Switzerland which saw France eliminated at the round-of-16 stage.
Mbappe responded to the claim on Twitter and said: “I explained to him well that above all else it was in relation to racism, NOT the penalty.
Oui enfin je lui ai surtout bien expliqué que c’était par rapport au racisme et NON au penalty.
Mais lui considérait qu’il n’y avait pas eu de racisme… https://t.co/wZ1nQfb4l4
— Kylian Mbappé (@KMbappe) June 19, 2022
“However, he thought that there hadn’t been any racism…”
The striker’s comments come after Le Graet claimed that racism didn’t exist in the sport two years ago and said: “When a black player scores a goal, the whole stadium is on its feet.”
Former France international Patrice Evra slammed the president and called on him to quit.
After receiving racist messages on social media during the Euros, Mbappe had informed L’Equipe that he pondered retiring from international football.
“I have always placed the French national team above everything and I will always put it above everything,” he said last October.
“I have never taken a single Euro to play for the French national team and I will always play for my national team for free.
“Above all, I never wanted to be a problem. But from the moment where I felt like that I was starting to become a problem and that people felt I was a problem … The most important thing is the French national team, and if the French national team is happier without me, it is like that.
“I have so much love for the French national team that I abstract from it all. What shocked me, again, was being called a monkey for the penalty. That is what I wanted support around, not because I took my penalty to the left and [Yann] Sommer stopped it.”
