Liverpool and Arsenal should avoid Kylian Mbappe

In his exclusive column for CaughtOffside, former Aston Villa and Liverpool attacker Stan Collymore discusses some of football’s biggest talking points, including Kylian Mbappe’s future, Dan Ashworth’s potential switch to Man United, how Trent Alexander-Arnold’s injury could affect his England career and much more.

Liverpool and Arsenal must avoid bringing Kylian Mbappe to England

Kylian Mbappe will leave Paris Saint-Germain at the end of the season and it looks like Real Madrid will be the superstar’s next destination. The reason the La Liga giants will very likely be his next club is the same as when I moved from Nottingham Forest to Liverpool. It’s fact that you are following in the footsteps of some of the greatest players to have played the game. You are testing your abilities by trying to match the achievements and numbers of that historic club’s legends.

Players don’t think with the mindset of going somewhere and building from scratch and hoping other players follow their path in the future. From my point of view, most players will think ‘I’m wearing Daglish’s number or I could score more goals than Kevin Keegan’ when joining a huge club with a glorious history. That is why Real Madrid are such a draw for so many players across several generations.

I can see Liverpool or Arsenal trying to get involved in the race but my advice to them would be to stay away from Mbappe. The French star is a great player but he will demolish their wage structure and not only that, the temptation to push the boat out for him will always be there, which could have a ripple effect across the whole dressing room.

Arsenal have a fragile ecosystem built around young players who are all on this journey of getting the Gunners back to the top together. There are no superstar names in that dressing room but they could be in the future. Mbappe had a lot of power at PSG, which was evident over the last few years. That doesn’t just go away and I worry that it could affect this current Arsenal squad if the French star tried to flex his status again in North London. The PSG star would undoubtedly score plenty of goals but would he make the team better?

At Real Madrid, it would be ok as there are other huge names such as Bellingham, Vinicius Jnr, Modric and Kroos; therefore, Mbappe becomes just another superstar within a team of superstars, who also have one of the most respected managers in the world.

The same goes for Liverpool. The Merseyside club have had…