Former Manchester United winger Ryan Giggs has revealed that the club scouted Kylian Mbappé when he was at Monaco and decided against him signing him.
Giggs is United’s record appearance holder and after a distinguished playing career, had a brief stint as interim boss before being assistant manager to Louis van Gaal between 2014 and 2016.
It was during this period under the Dutchman that the former Wales international was made aware of Mbappé in fortuitous circumstances.
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“So, I’m in the south of France. I was coaching United, so it’d be 2015. I’ve been for a walk in the local village and I’m walking back to the hotel. I’m walking on the beach back to the hotel. And you can feel, I can feel someone, you know, when you feel someone like following you,” he said on the Rio Ferdinand Presents podcast.
“And I’m like, I get to the hotel and then all of a sudden I can feel someone coming up to me. Anyway, this guy is called Lionel, French guy. So he comes up to me and says ‘hi, I’m Lionel. I just wanted to just say hello. I’m a big United fan and big fan of yours. But I watch a lot of youth football in France, and you have to look at this player. He’s called Kylian Mbappé. He’s at Monaco and I think he’s a player for Man United.’
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“A few weeks later, he emailed me all the details. So me and Albert [Stuivenberg] again, who’s the coach with Arsenal, he was another assistant at United at the time. We used to in the afternoons just go and watch games or go and watch players at the training ground. So anyway, I’ve told him about this thing. He says ‘come on, let’s get him up.’ And we got a few youth games with Monaco and we seen him and just like, ‘wow, what is this?’ You know, you can see players and they can be special, but he did look exceptional, obviously.
“So anyway, we told the scouting team. They went to watch him. Someone in France went to watch him and he was actually playing PSG. Monaco were playing PSG. So they went to Paris to watch him. Anyway, I think a few weeks later, I said to this guy ‘how did it go?’ and he went ‘yeah, they weren’t too sure about him, so we just left it, and that was it.'”
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Mbappé went on to join PSG on a season-long loan in 2017 before making the move permanent the following year.
Head to the Rio Ferdinand Presents YouTube channel at 9.00 UK time on Wednesday 9th September to watch the full interview.
