Kylian Mbappé's Ballon d'Or Challenge Amid Messi's Legacy
Kylian Mbappé spent the summer in North America looking every inch the heir to football’s throne. Eight goals, a charge to the semi-finals, the feeling that every time he touched the ball something seismic might happen. For a while, it looked like he had muscled his way back into the Ballon d’Or conversation by sheer force of talent.
Then Spain happened. And then Real Madrid’s season happened.
Defeat to La Roja on the international stage and a second straight campaign without major silverware at club level have dragged him back towards harsh reality. For all the fireworks, for all the numbers, the game’s most prestigious individual prize still bows to the biggest trophies. No Champions League. No World Cup. No Euros. In this era, that usually means no Ballon d’Or.
Into that familiar vacuum steps a very familiar figure.
Messi, again
At 39, Lionel Messi is not supposed to be dictating World Cups. He is not supposed to be matching Mbappé stride for stride on the scoring charts with eight goals of his own. He is not supposed to be dragging Argentina back to another final, three years after Qatar 2022, with the same sense of inevitability.
Yet here he is. One game from defending the title that many thought would be his last great act. One game from a ninth Golden Ball at a World Cup. One game from tilting the Ballon d’Or race back in his favour, again.
Former Arsenal and France forward Jérémie Aliadière can see where this is heading. Speaking to GOAL in association with Betinia NJ, he didn’t bother dressing it up when asked if Mbappé’s wait for a first Ballon d’Or is likely to continue.
“Yeah, I think so,” he said. If Mbappé had capped his first season at Real Madrid with something tangible, the story might be different. “If he's had a fantastic year in terms of winning something with Real Madrid, then he probably could still be in the running but without winning anything with Madrid…”
The numbers are not the issue. They rarely are with Mbappé.
Aliadière was quick to acknowledge that. “Even if on a personal level, I thought he had a great season, scored a ridiculous amount of goals and carried the team for most part of the season. So, individually, he's had a fantastic season but, unfortunately, without winning any trophies we know the rules to be a Ballon d'Or. You've got to win, Champions League or World Cup or Euros.”
The rules. Brutal, simple, unforgiving. Mbappé has ticked almost every box but the biggest one this year. That gap is where Messi lives.
Kane’s missed chance, Argentina’s opening
Mbappé is not alone in his frustration. Harry Kane, prolific again, saw his own outside chance vanish when England fell short on the international stage. Aliadière lumped them together in the same sentence of regret.
“So, having not done that, I can't see him being the Ballon d'Or. It's a shame because I thought Harry Kane would have had a good shot if England went all the way as well, but same for him.”
When the dust settles, Aliadière expects the spotlight to swing south.
“I think it’ll probably be one of Argentina. Messi, if he wins it again, I think everybody's just going to be mesmerised by the age and what he's produced at the World Cup and forget that he plays in MLS for Inter Miami.”
That last line cuts to the heart of the debate. Messi has spent the 2025 club season in North America, not in the Champions League glare. Yet he has not drifted into semi-retirement. He lifted the MLS Cup with Inter Miami. He collected MVP honours. He turned a fledgling project into a trophy-winning side and then switched seamlessly back into Argentina’s colours, where the stakes never seem to faze him.
England discovered that the hard way in Atlanta. In a dramatic semi-final, Messi again found the moments that matter. Again, he walked off as the difference.
Another Golden Ball? It cannot be dismissed. Not when he keeps bending the calendar to his will.
The Ronaldo contrast and the Ballon d’Or fault line
Former Brazil midfielder and ex-MLS player Kleberson has watched this late-career chapter unfold with a mixture of awe and inevitability. Speaking to GOAL, he was asked whether Messi could really win yet another Ballon d’Or and move four clear of Cristiano Ronaldo.
“Wow! That guy never stops!” he said. For Kleberson, the equation is stark: “Argentina has more chance of winning the World Cup with Messi than any other country, just because Messi is still playing at a good level.”
He drew a sharp line between Messi’s situation and Ronaldo’s.
“It’s different from Ronaldo. He is still playing at a level, but the players around Ronaldo, it’s not the same as Messi has with Argentina. It’s purity. What Portuguese players have and Argentine players have is completely different. That’s why Messi has a lot of chance.”
In other words, Messi is not just performing; he is operating inside a system and a generation built to maximise him. If that ends with Argentina lifting another World Cup, Kleberson sees the Ballon d’Or race as a formality.
“If he goes and wins the World Cup, 100 per cent he’s going to be up to win the Ballon d’Or again. He’s brilliant. Even Brazilian players and fans look at him and want to see good players win the Ballon d’Or and the World Cup - players that are a joy to see play. Messi is one of those.”
Mbappé’s problem: timing
So where does all this leave Mbappé? Statistically, in elite company. Narratively, stuck in a holding pattern.
His World Cup run in North America was explosive but ended in the semi-finals. His first full tilt at glory with Real Madrid in this new era produced goals but not the Champions League crown that shapes Ballon d’Or ballots. Without that defining team success, he is vulnerable to someone like Messi – older, slower, but armed with another World Cup final and a fresh stack of trophies, even if they come from MLS.
The Frenchman has time. Messi does not. Yet as long as the Argentine keeps stretching his career at the very top and keeps wrapping his legacy in more silver, Mbappé’s ascent to the Ballon d’Or summit will have to wait.
The stage is set: one more World Cup final, one more chance for Messi to tilt the scales again. If he delivers, how many voters will really be able to look past a 39-year-old genius still ruling the biggest game of all?
